Teeth
by EGB Fan
Summary: The Extreme Ghostbusters are called to the home of a girl who has recently lost a tooth. What can it mean when the tooth fairy apparently pays her twenty dollars for it?
1. Chapter 1

_Extreme Ghostbusters:_** Teeth**

Chapter 1

The Ecto-1 was on its way to an inexpensive, ground-floor two-bedroom apartment one Tuesday morning in September. When it arrived, there was a police car parked outside, and an anxious mother was bouncing on the balls of her feet in the doorway of the apartment block.

'Thank you for coming so fast,' the mother said, as Roland, Garrett, Eduardo and Kylie got out of the car and slammed the doors. 'I can't tell you how – oh, hello!' Her worried expression dissolved into a look of joyful recognition.

'Hi,' said Eduardo. The other three Ghostbusters looked at him expectantly.

'How are you?' the woman asked.

'I'm good,' Eduardo said. 'How are you?'

'Well, I'm a little worried,' said his friend, with a nervous twitter. 'By the way, your brother's here.'

'He is?' Eduardo's polite smile melted away.

'Yes. He didn't have to come himself – it was good of him. How's Kevin?'

'Great.'

'And Beth?'

'Yeah, she's cool.'

'Well, it's nice to see you,' the woman finished the exchange, with a smile that went all the way to her eyes. 'I'd better go and see if the police are done yet. I'll be right back.'

She disappeared into the apartment building. For a moment, no one spoke. Then Roland asked, 'How do you know her?'

Eduardo replied, 'I don't have a clue.'

The other three Ghostbusters burst out laughing, and half a beat later Eduardo joined in. Then, when they had managed to calm themselves, he asked, 'What was her name again?'

'Helen something,' said Kylie.

Eduardo looked, if anything, even more confused.

'She seemed to really like you, Eddie,' said Garrett. 'Looks like you got competition, Ky.'

Kylie didn't seem to have an answer to this, and was saved the trouble of thinking of one when Carl Rivera bustled out of the building and made a beeline for the Ghostbusters. Eduardo stepped forward to meet him like a lioness preparing to defend her cubs from a marauding male.

'I wish you wouldn't do that,' Roland said quietly, bending down to Garrett's level.

'Hey,' Garrett hissed back. 'Is it my fault if they don't have a sense of humour between them?'

Carl, meanwhile, was looking Eduardo over suspiciously as he gave his explanation of why the Ghostbusters were there.

'She called us.'

'What did she call _you_ for?' said Carl. 'Why would a ghost leave twenty dollars under some girl's pillow? That's the craziest thing I ever heard! Well, they _are_ crazy. You know that.'

_'How_ do I know that?' Eduardo asked, trying to stay strong under his brother's withering gaze.

Carl glared at him, clearly thinking that he was being very dense. 'It's that Stephens brat.'

'Who?'

'Zora.'

'Oh, Zora!' At last, the chimes of understanding crept into Eduardo's voice. 'I like Zora.'

'That's because you're an idiot. She probably stole the twenty from Helen's purse.'

Eduardo scowled. 'That's real nice, Carlos.'

'Her mother is obviously very worried,' said Kylie, stepping up beside Eduardo. 'I mean, it'd be easy enough for some pervert to climb in through her window, wouldn't it?'

Carl glared at her, and said, 'This is an ongoing investigation. I can't tell you anything.'

'Can't we go in yet?' said Garrett.

'I guess we can in a second,' said Eduardo, as a female police officer emerged from the apartment building behind Helen. 'Hi, Linda.'

'Hi, Eduardo.' The officer smiled politely at Eduardo, and then turned to Carl. 'I couldn't get her to tell me anything, I'm afraid. If you could keep trying...' She looked at Helen.

'Of course,' Helen said. 'So what happens now?'

'Well,' said Linda, 'I'm afraid we couldn't find anything to go on. Just stay vigilant, and if you see or hear of _anything_ suspicious, don't hesitate to let us know.'

Helen nodded and said, somewhat shakily, 'Okay, thank you.'

The two police officers left, Linda with a smile at Eduardo, and Carl with a frown.

'I just don't know _what_ it is!' Helen said, turning to face the four Ghostbusters. 'Maybe it's nothing to do with you. I don't know – I just want you to check. And then what if it is? You have a better success rate with that kind of thing than the police have with disappearing weirdos, don't you?'

_'What_ kind of thing, ma'am?' asked Roland.

'Well,' said Helen, 'Zora's sure it must have been the tooth fairy. Anyway, you'd better come in.'

'Sounds like a plan,' said Garrett, whipping out his PKE meter. He and Kylie followed closely behind Helen as she led them into the apartment block, and then into her apartment. Roland lagged behind, keeping Eduardo near him with a hand on his shoulder.

'How do you know the kid?' Roland asked.

'She goes to school with Kevin,' said Eduardo. 'I really don't know her that well.'

Helen and the Ghostbusters crowded into a small living room, and at once the PKE meters started to register a weak reading.

'What does that mean?' Helen asked anxiously, staring at the nearest meter, which happened to be Garrett's.

'It means there is or was something ectoplasmic here,' Garrett said.

'Oh!' said Helen. 'So... now what?'

'Now we'll try and figure out what's going on,' said Kylie. 'Can you tell us exactly what happened?'

'Of course,' said Helen. 'Zora lost a tooth yesterday, and she asked me for an envelope to put it in for the tooth fairy. She knows very well where we keep all the stationery, and it's not on a high shelf or anything – I was sure she was just dropping hints. So, last night after she was asleep, I went in to put a dollar under her pillow. And instead of the tooth, I found a twenty dollar bill. I just didn't know what to think!'

'Can we see this twenty dollar bill?' asked Roland.

'Zora has it,' said Helen. 'I know I shouldn't have given in to her, but... well, being a single parent isn't easy.'

'No one's judging you, Helen,' Eduardo said kindly, as though he had known her all his life. 'Can we talk to Zora?'

'Well,' said Helen, with the slightest hint of a smile, 'if anyone can, you can. I'll go and get her. I'd better tell her you need to look in her room as well, hadn't I?'

'Yes please,' said Roland.

Helen left the room, and once again all eyes turned to Eduardo.

'If anyone can, you can?' said Garrett, with raised eyebrows and a laugh threatening to burst out.

'I don't know why she said that,' said Eduardo. 'I really don't know them that well.'

As he spoke, the shrill and angry voice of a child came wafting across the hall, occasionally punctuated by Helen's pleading tones. The four Ghostbusters exchanged looks, each silently wondering how long they would have to stand there, and whether it was worth starting anything else. Moments later, however, the voices stopped and Zora herself appeared in the doorway.

'Hi,' she said, looking warily at Eduardo.

'Hi, Zora,' he said. 'How are you?'

'You can't have my twenty dollars.'

'Well, we just need to see it.'

'No. You don't want me to have it.'

'I don't care if you have it or not,' said Eduardo. 'I just want to see it.'

'I don't believe you.'

Eduardo turned to the others. 'Is anybody going to help me out?'

'_They_ can't make me show you!' Zora said, suddenly sounding furious. 'Who are they, anyway? I don't know them!'

'I'm sorry, Zora,' said Eduardo, turning back to face her. 'I'll introduce you.'

'I don't want to be introduced.'

'I do,' said Roland.

'Great,' said Eduardo. 'Zora, this is Roland. Roland, Zora.'

'Hi, Zora.'

'You can't have my twenty dollars!'

'Will you just answer some questions for us, Zora?' asked Roland.

Zora shrugged and frowned at the space in between Roland and Eduardo. Then she crossed the room to the coffee table, and began picking at a scratch in the surface with her fingernail. Garrett wheeled his chair towards the doorway and beckoned Kylie to follow.

'How do you think the twenty dollars got there, Zora?' asked Roland.

Zora shrugged.

'Your mom says you think it's the tooth fairy.'

'Well,' said Zora, looking up, 'who else would pay twenty dollars for a tooth?'

'Your mom also said the going rate was _one_ dollar,' said Eduardo.

'My mom says a lot of things.'

'She told us what happened with your tooth yesterday,' said Roland. 'Let's see the gap.'

In his experience, children liked this request. Zora was no exception. She approached the two men, stretching out her bottom lip a long way with her forefinger, and said, 'Iss a wong way wack.'

Eduardo and Roland both stooped and peered into the girl's mouth.

'I see it,' said Eduardo. 'How many do you have left?'

'Six,' said Zora, releasing her lip abruptly. 'How many does Kevin have left?'

'Two, I think.'

Zora looked annoyed to hear this.

'Can you tell us about yesterday?' Roland asked. 'Maybe you remember it differently from your mom, or you know something she doesn't.'

'I don't know anything,' said Zora. 'My tooth came out, and I asked Mom for an envelope because I thought she'd give me some money. I never believed in the tooth fairy before, but now I _know_ it's true, because when Mom came in she woke me up and she started freaking out and asking me why there was twenty dollars under my pillow. That's the first time I knew anything about it.'

'How can you be so sure it was the tooth fairy?' asked Eduardo. 'Maybe it was a creep, like the cops think.'

'I'm not stupid, Eduardo! I'd know if someone broke into my room, because you _can't_ open the window from the outside, and I'd know if they bought my tooth for twenty dollars because my head was on it! Anyway, who would _do_ that? Give me money, okay, but take my _tooth_? Jeez!'

'Don't get mad,' Eduardo said calmly. 'We think it's the tooth fairy too. See this?' He showed her the reading on his PKE meter, and she made an evil face at it. 'That means some kind of ghost or demon or something was here. But if we're going to figure it out, and stop your mom from worrying about it, we need to know everything. Zora, the more you can tell us, the sooner your mom can stop getting people round here to investigate.'

There was a moment of silence. Roland was impressed by Eduardo's little speech, and didn't want to say anything else. Zora, for a second or two, did not look convinced. She glared at Eduardo with a look of deep suspicion, and he held her gaze.

'If I tell you everything I know,' she said, 'what are you going to do?'

'I don't know,' said Eduardo. 'Maybe nothing, if this thing isn't a threat to you.'

'She's going to owe me another hundred and twenty dollars over the next couple of years.'

'Good math,' said Eduardo.

Zora smiled, ever so slightly.

'Please tell us, Zora,' said Roland.

'Oh, all right.' Zora went to an armchair, threw herself into it and gestured for Eduardo and Roland to sit on the couch. 'I heard that some kids across town get two dollars for their teeth, and I thought that _proved_ there was no tooth fairy, or she'd give everybody the same, right? But I left a note anyway... I really didn't think there was any tooth fairy to read it... I was sure my mom would find it and think I was cute for still believing in fairies, and I thought she'd give me at least two dollars. I asked for five. I did _not _ask for twenty.'

'Do you still have this note?' asked Roland.

'No. It was gone when Mom found the twenty.'

'What did it say?'

'It said... this might not be exactly it, but it's pretty close... "Dear Tooth Fairy, I've heard that some kids from the richer part of town get more money for their teeth than me. That means you are either a snob or you are meaner than other tooth fairies, if there are lots of you. If you are not going to pay me a fair price for my teeth, I would rather keep them. I have decided to charge five dollars a tooth from now on. Yours sincerely, Zora Stephens." '

'That's real good, Zora,' said Eduardo. 'Simple and to the point. And I like how you called her out on her zip code prejudice.'

'And there was nothing else under your pillow apart from the twenty?' asked Roland.

'Well...' Zora looked at her hands.

'What?' asked Roland.

'You can tell us,' said Eduardo. 'It's okay, Zora.'

'Okay, well she... wrote me a reply. It was under the pillow as well, but Mom didn't find it. I found it this morning, after I woke up.'

'Can we see it?' asked Roland.

'Who are you going to show it to?' asked Zora.

'Just our boss,' said Roland.

'What will he do? It's just the tooth fairy. She's going to keep giving me twenty dollars for my teeth – that's _all!'_

'If that's really all,' said Eduardo, 'I don't see how we can stop her. Please let us see the note, Zora.'

~.~

Garrett and Kylie had met up with Helen, and been shown into a small bedroom that was wallpapered with animal posters and carpeted with animal books and magazines. The bed had been made up with a dolphin pillowcase and quilt cover set, and several stuffed animals were sitting on it, lined up against the wall.

'I can't get over all that crap on the floor,' said Garrett, once Helen had scampered off to another room. 'You'll have to move it.'

Kylie gave him a look, and then began to clear a space on the floor for him.

'This room is brimming with ecto,' she said, examining her PKE meter as Garrett wheeled his way into the room. 'Some kind of supernatural entity put that twenty under her pillow all right.'

'What the hell did that mom think she was doing anyway, letting the kid keep it?' said Garrett.

'Ssh,' said Kylie, 'she might hear you! Anyway, you shouldn't judge people like that. Have you ever been a single parent?'

'No. Have you?'

'No, but _I'm_ not judging her. Anyway, I kind of get it. When Pagan wants to be fed at three thirty in the morning, and he starts knocking everything off my dresser, I've been known to give in.'

'Well, that girl has _got_ to be worse than Pagan. Why does the mom think Eddie can handle her?'

'I don't know.' Kylie was concentrating very hard on her PKE meter.

'Really? All those times you've enticed him back to your lair, and he's never mentioned them?'

'What, never in the three months since he _obviously_ started telling me _everything_? The answer's no, okay?'

Garrett stared at her. 'You don't have to bite my head off, Ky.'

'Sorry,' said Kylie. 'I'm sorry, Garrett. It's just... I wish you wouldn't. You know?'

'All right,' said Garrett, thinking of Roland's words to him earlier. 'I'm sorry.'

'Okay.' Kylie turned her attention back to Zora's pillow. 'Look, you heard what Eduardo said – he doesn't even know them that well.'

'Yeah?' said Garrett. 'Well, Helen sure seems to know _him.'_

'You've been moving my stuff! Why do people think they can come in here and move my stuff?'

Kylie and Garrett both turned round to face Zora, who was standing in the doorway, with Roland and Eduardo behind her.

'Sorry, Zora,' said Garrett. 'We thought it'd be better than running it over.'

'No one said my room had wheelchair access. This is not a public building. It's _private!'_

'Be nice to him, Zora, please,' said Eduardo.

Zora turned and frowned at him. 'What is he, your boyfriend?'

'Never you mind.'

Garrett's jaw dropped, and he began to make a noise like a laying chicken. Roland, thinking that Eduardo's answer was really quite sensible, stopped Garrett's clucking with a hand on his shoulder and said, 'May we see this note now, please?'

Zora stalked across the room, cleared a space in her collection of stuffed animals and produced an okapi with a zip in its back. She unzipped it, and from the okapi's innards she produced a tiny piece of paper. She then stalked back across the room, passing Kylie, Garrett and Roland, and held the paper out to Eduardo.

'Thank you,' he said.

'Say it in Spanish.'

'_Gracias, se__ñ__orita_.'

'Say: "Thank you, Zora, and I promise you get to keep your twenty dollars." In Spanish.'

'I can't promise that, _querida_. So, we done here?'

'I guess so,' said Kylie. 'For now.'

'If we really aren't going to see that twenty dollars today,' Garrett added, looking at Zora.

'Would you swap it for another twenty?' asked Zora. 'Or two tens? Or four fives? I don't want twenty ones. I bet you don't _have_ twenty ones.'

'I don't think that would be a good idea,' said Roland.

'Then I'd like you to leave,' said Zora.

'Whatever you want, Zora,' said Eduardo. 'What about you – are you going to school today?'

'None of your business.'

'You're right.' Eduardo stepped further into the room and shepherded his team-mates towards the door. 'It was nice seeing you, _querida_. _Adios_.'

~.~

'You _like_ that kid?' said Garrett, when they were back in the Ecto-1 and on their way to the firehouse. 'Is that true? You actually _like_ her?'

'Yeah,' said Eduardo, with a shrug.

'Seriously?'

'Yes!'

'Why?'

Eduardo shrugged again, and said, 'Somebody should.'

'That's nice, Eduardo,' said Roland, giving Eduardo the warmest of smiles in the rear-view mirror.

'Yeah,' Kylie added, turning in her seat with a smile of her own, and it was closer to hot than warm. Garrett seemed about to say something, then turned it into a cough and looked out of the window.

~.~

When they were back in the firehouse lobby and getting out of the car, Eduardo was still being pummelled with questions about Zora and Helen. Egon and Janine, both looking over some paperwork at Janine's desk, looked up and listened in.

'What happened to her father?' Roland was asking.

'I don't know, man,' said Eduardo. 'I've told you, I hardly know them. I've talked to them, like, twice when I was meeting Kevin from school. I just don't _know_!'

'Eddie, c'mon, give the guy a break,' said Garrett. 'He was only asking.'

'I'm sorry,' said Eduardo. 'Just don't ask me anything else, okay? You all seem to think I'm keeping something back, but I'm not! I've seen her at school a couple of times, and I try to be nice to her because nobody else is. I guess Helen noticed and she appreciates it.'

'Is this the girl with America's most expensive tooth?' asked Janine.

'Yeah.' Eduardo approached the desk and handed Egon the note from the tooth fairy. 'She left the tooth fairy a note asking for more money – she says she thought her mom would read it – and then she got this with the twenty dollars.'

'The mother doesn't know about the note,' added Roland.

Egon squinted at the tiny writing on the scrap of paper, and read aloud what it said.

_Dear Zora,_

_If you've got the teeth, I've got the cash. I am no snob. Believe me, we can use these, and I'm prepared to pay top whack. There __are__ other tooth fairies. Forget them!_

_Yours truly,_

_The__ Tooth Fairy_

'Any idea what we should do with this, Egon?' asked Garrett.

'At the moment,' said Egon, 'none at all. I have dealt with a tooth fairy before; this note is right in that there are several of them. But overpaying for teeth? That is completely unprecedented. Well, as far as I know. Of course, I don't know everything that's ever happened.'

'Sure you do, Egon,' said Kylie. 'You know everything supernatural that's ever been recorded, anyway – and if there's no record, then to all intents and purposes, it's unprecedented.'

'Kylie,' said Egon, 'I am quite sure I don't know everything. Perhaps you'd like to start researching this for me.'

'Sure she would,' Eduardo said stiffly, and he mooched off towards the lockers, shaking his proton pack from his back.

Egon wandered off with the tooth fairy's note, if that was indeed what it was, and Janine returned to her desk. Kylie watched Eduardo's back for a moment, and then followed him across the room.

'What's with them?' Garrett said Roland. 'They're both really touchy today.'

'Nothing to do with us, Gar,' said Roland.

~.~

'If you're being jealous,' said Kylie. Then she stopped.

Eduardo looked at her. 'Yeah?'

'Don't.'

'Okay.' He threw his gloves and elbow pads into his locker, then started to remove the top half of his clothing.

'About that kid,' said Kylie.

'I've told you everything.'

'Yes, I believe you. I just...' She stopped for a moment, distracted by the familiar but ever welcome sight of his naked torso. Then she managed to finish, 'I think it's really sweet that you care.'

'She's just a kid,' Eduardo said, managing to shrug his shoulders and pull on his round-the-house white t-shirt at the same time. 'She don't deserve the shit she gets. But I don't care _that_ much. I mean, I _care,_ but I don't get why Helen thinks I'm so involved.'

'Well,' said Kylie, 'Zora sure seems to like you. I guess I'm not the only girl who likes it when you speak Spanish, huh?'

'_Querida_,' said Eduardo, snaking his arms around her waist. 'Nobody likes that as much as you.'

~.~

Kylie was a little flushed when she was choosing her books ten minutes later, but other than that she remained professional. So did Eduardo. He went looking for Roland, and found him fiddling around with some equipment. Leaning against his work surface, Eduardo said, 'Y'know, Beth keeps all Kevin's baby teeth in a drawer, in plastic bottles.'

'That's nice,' said Roland.

'What about you? Your parents are the tooth fairy, right?'

'Oh, sure. Even now, I know that for a fact because I did it once, when three of the little ones lost a tooth in the same day.'

'Okay,' said Eduardo, 'so what does that mean? It isn't a fairy? It's some other kind of demon?'

'Well, what about Egon saying the old team dealt with a tooth fairy before? If that's right, why do they leave out my family and Kevin?'

'I don't know, man. Maybe they just do it for kids whose parents don't bother. Or maybe they let the parents pay the money, and if they don't put the teeth some place special like Beth does, they come and get them after. But would a tooth fairy _really_ pay twenty bucks?'

'I don't know. Maybe it's not really after teeth at all. Zora could be in for something much more serious – we'll have to keep an eye on her. But right now we just need to wait and see if Egon or Kylie's research comes up with anything.'

'What if it doesn't?'

'Why wouldn't it?' asked Roland. 'You know, you could try a little reading yourself, if you want to do something.'

'I _do_ want to do something,' said Eduardo. 'And I don't just want to _pretend_ I'm doing something by opening a book. Listen, what if we laid a trap for this thing? Do what Zora did – leave a tooth and write a note?'

'Whose tooth? If you're talking about involving other kids...'

'No, don't be stupid. We could use one of Kevin's. Or some of them.'

'Oh.' At last, Roland seemed interested. 'But wouldn't Beth be sorry to lose them? I'll bet she knows just how many there are, and she could tell if one was missing.'

'Yeah, but we won't let the thing take it. We'll trap it first.'

'Okay, so... how would this work? You'd go to sleep with one of Kevin's teeth under your pillow, and hope this thing knows you have it... and leave a note like Zora did... what if you didn't wake up? Zora didn't. Or what if it didn't come?'

Eduardo shrugged, and said, 'If it don't work, it don't work. It's worth a try, ain't it? Anyway, I wouldn't just go to sleep like normal. We'd have the PKE meters... we could take turns staying awake... here in the firehouse.'

'It might not work,' said Roland. 'Perhaps this thing is smart enough to recognise a trap, or perhaps it's not interested in taking someone else's old teeth from college students. But you're right – it's worth a try. So I guess the first thing we have to do is get at least one of Kevin's teeth, right?'

'Right.'

'That's up to you, then. I'll drive you.'

~.~

Eduardo's eagerness had made Roland keen to be off, but he found himself deflating somewhat when Eduardo said he wanted to let the others know what they were doing, and it turned into a whole conversation between him and Kylie.

'Here?' said Kylie, who was sitting on the couch with a book in her lap. 'Tonight?'

'Yes,' said Eduardo.

'Oh.' She looked put out, and Eduardo thought he knew why.

'We need to get this done,' he said.

'I know,' said Kylie. 'Okay, well, I'll tell the others. And if we're going to do that, babe, will you please run in and feed Pagan on your way back? And make sure he has plenty of water.'

'Why worry about that? He only drinks leftover shower water.'

Kylie laughed, and said, 'Fill his bowl anyway. Then no one can say I let him go thirsty.'

'Okay.'

They kept Roland waiting a little longer by kissing deeply for a good fifteen seconds. Then Eduardo, with some effort, prised himself away and made briskly for the stairs. On his way past Roland, he tapped his arm and said, 'Come on, man, let's go.'

Roland went without a word. Kylie went back to her book, looked through a few more pages and then pushed it to one side. She went downstairs, and found Garrett immersed in a little solo basketball practice, cheered on from the sidelines by Slimer.

'Hi, Kylie,' said Garrett. 'Do you know where Roland and Eddie went off to in such a hurry?'

'Yes,' said Kylie, and she told him the plan for the coming night.

'Spending the night here is such a pain in the butt,' said Garrett, once she had finished. 'I guess it's a good idea, though, if we've got nothing else.'

'I couldn't find anything helpful in those books. Mind you, I wasn't at it very long.'

'Books shmooks – this requires action! Just as long as you and Eddie can control – sorry! Sorry.' He clamped his mouth shut, turned away from her and carried on shooting hoops.

Kylie took a moment to look at the back of his head, not sure whether to frown or smile. Then she made her way over to Janine's desk.

'Hi, Kylie,' said Janine, glancing up only briefly from what was on her computer screen. 'What can I do for you?'

'I need to tell you the plan,' said Kylie. 'We're going to see if we can trap Helen Stephens' demon with one or more of Kevin's milk teeth, which'll mean spending the night here. I'm sure we can do without Egon, though, if you want to take him home.'

'I expect I can do without him for one night,' said Janine. 'Go and ask him what he wants to do, if you like – and you can see if he's found anything useful on his database.'

'Okay,' said Kylie. Then she didn't move.

Janine looked up properly this time, withdrew her hands from her keyboard and gave Kylie an encouraging smile. 'Is there something you want to talk to me about, honey?'

'Well.' Kylie pulled up a chair and flopped onto it. 'I _might_ need some relationship advice.'

'Sure,' said Janine. 'How about, be careful not to set the bed on fire? Your relationship looks pretty good from where I'm standing.'

'You mean it looks pretty physical.'

'Yes. I'm sorry - I know that's not everything. Tell me.'

'Well,' said Kylie, 'when I was in high school, my mother warned me about confusing lust with love. I always thought I could never be so stupid, but I think I understand now. I mean, it's easy enough to feel good about someone who...' She dropped her gaze. 'You know.'

'Yeah, I know,' said Janine, looking back to her computer screen to save Kylie's blushes. 'I did that once, when I was young. Then the guy turned out to be just like the rest of them. Well, most of them. I actually cried over him. What a waste of tears _that _was.'

Kylie said nothing. When Janine turned back to her, she looked like she'd been slapped in the face.

'Sorry,' said Janine. 'Look, it's a high risk game – you know that. If you get hurt, it sucks, but you get over it and in the end it makes you stronger. But then maybe what you're feeling is exactly what it seems, and if you really want my advice, I think you should give it a chance.'

'I might have known you'd say that. Well, I guess it's good advice.'

'Don't you doubt it, kid. Anyway, listen, I really don't think Eduardo's like the guy I mentioned. For one thing, he seems to care about this girl with the tooth, doesn't he?'

'Yeah, and that's nice,' said Kylie, 'but the scary thing is that it... well, it kind of turns me on. That's not right, is it?'

'Oh, I think that's okay,' said Janine, with an indulgent smile. 'Now don't freak out, Kylie, but maybe – _just _maybe – you're confusing love with lust.'

At this, Kylie gave a snort, and said, 'I don't see how I can when he never tells me anything.'

Janine raised her eyebrows. 'Never?'

'Well... not never _ever_. Every three weeks or so. That must make about four things since we hooked up. Let's see. The snow day, the father, the French Monopoly... that's it. Well, I guess he's due another one.'

'That's something to look forward to, then.'

'I hope so,' said Kylie. 'It won't be tonight, though. I'd better go tell Egon about the plan. Thanks for the talk, Janine.'

_To be continued..._


	2. Chapter 2

_Extreme Ghostbusters:_** Teeth**

Chapter 2

'I'll wait in the car, shall I?' said Roland.

'No, man, come in. Beth'll be real nice to you, I promise.'

Two minutes later, Roland and Eduardo were sitting with Beth at her kitchen table, with an open cookie jar in front of them and each of the three sipping at a cup of coffee. Roland waited while Eduardo explained that they wanted some of Kevin's milk teeth, and why.

'We'll be real careful with them, Beth,' he finished up.

'Oh, don't worry, they're only teeth,' said Beth. 'I wonder if other moms keep them or I'm just crazy.'

'You're not crazy,' said Roland.

'I'll get some for you,' said Beth. 'There's three lots of six, I think. Will six be all right?'

'Anything you can give us will be wonderful,' said Roland.

Beth kept the teeth in plastic screw-top bottles, in a kitchen drawer with an assortment of small containers and peculiar looking implements, such as old corkscrews and an egg slicer.

'Thanks,' said Eduardo, as Beth handed him the bottle of teeth.

'I'm happy to help,' said Beth. 'Goodness knows Zora doesn't need any more trouble – she has enough of that at school.'

'What kind of trouble?' asked Roland.

'Just the usual kind,' said Beth. 'Problems with making friends, not doing her homework...'

'She's been in a few fights,' Eduardo added. 'Not many – just one every two years or so.'

'I wonder if she made it to school today,' said Roland.

'Why don't we find out?' said Eduardo. 'We'll pick Kevin up later and see if she's there.'

'Would you?' asked Beth. 'Oh, that would be a huge help. Thank you.'

Roland quietly accepted this task, thanked Beth for her hospitality and then returned to his blue Mustang with Eduardo. Once they were seated, he asked, 'What do you want to do now?'

'Why is it up to me?' asked Eduardo.

'Well, you seem to be leading this operation.'

'I guess I do. Well.' Eduardo looked at the clock on the dashboard. 'I think we should go back to Zora and Helen's apartment. If Zora _is_ at school, and Helen's home, we could ask Helen if she can find the twenty dollars for us. If Zora's home, we won't learn anything from picking up Kevin, but we'll do it anyway. Before that, I need to feed Pagan. I should do that after lunch, so he gets his food as late as possible. You wanna get lunch after Helen's?'

'Sure,' said Roland. 'I think that'll be a first – you and me having lunch together without the others.'

'Cool beans, man.'

~.~

Revisiting Helen's apartment proved pointless, as no one was home.

'I guess Helen went to work,' said Eduardo. 'Makes sense.'

'So then Zora's at school,' said Roland.

'We'll maybe see her later, then.'

'Is there anything else we can do here?'

'Nah. Let's get lunch.'

They returned to the car, and Eduardo directed Roland to a nice little eatery where all the waiting staff knew him and asked after Kevin. Then, when they'd eaten, they went to the large converted house where Kylie rented the cheap room in the loft.

Eduardo invited Roland up to Kylie's room like he owned the place, and let them both in with a key for each of Kylie's three locks. He then called Pagan, had quite a long conversation with him ('How you doing, man?' 'Meow.' 'How does an early dinner sound?' 'Prrrr...') and allowed him to attack his hand with teeth and all four feet.

'That looks painful,' said Roland.

'Yeah,' said Eduardo, wincing a little, 'but he's only playing. He likes me now – don't you, _gatito_? He wasn't sure at first. Let's get you some dinner, then, huh?'

'Meow.'

'I never imagined you talking to Pagan like that,' said Roland. 'Kylie must appreciate it.'

'I hope so.' Eduardo now stood in a corner with his back to Roland, concentrating on a pouch of chicken and liver flavoured cat food. 'Sometimes I think she only wants me for my body.'

Roland didn't know what to say to that, so he simply said, 'What?'

'Nothing, man, forget it. Yes, it's for you,' Eduardo said, as Pagan let out a desperate mew in the moment before his bowl hit the floor. 'I'd better top up his water like Kylie asked, and give him some dry food for later... and then what's next on the agenda for Eduardo and Roland's day of fun?'

'Pick up Kevin.'

Eduardo looked at the alarm clock by Kylie's bed. 'Well, not long now. We might as well go straight there.'

~.~

Outside the elementary school gates, Roland found that Eduardo wasn't as keen on talking to him as he had been on talking to Pagan. They seemed to have said all they could about Zora for the time being, and now Eduardo was turning Beth's plastic container over and over in his hand, making the teeth run from top to bottom and back again, and again and again, with an irritating rattle.

'Oh, look,' Roland said at last, with a sense of relief. 'I think some parents are starting to go in.'

'You're right.' Eduardo began to get out of the car. 'I'll be right back.'

Roland watched as Eduardo went through the ritual of meeting Kevin from school. A lot of the parents and guardians exchanged hellos with him. Then, when the children started to appear, some of them spoke to him as well. He was engaged in a conversation with a girl of about six when Kevin joined him, looking pleasantly surprised to find his uncle waiting for him instead of his mother. He also looked more than ready to get out of there. Surely, Roland thought, they'd be on their way in no time.

Then something changed. Eduardo froze for a moment before putting a hand on Kevin's shoulder, pointing him towards the Mustang and finally sprinting off across the playground.

'Hi, Kevin,' Roland said, as the boy opened one of the back doors and let himself into the car.

'Hey,' said Kevin. 'Thanks for giving me a ride.'

'No problem. What's going on?'

'It's Zora Stephens. She was attacking a couple of guys, and no one was doing anything.'

'_Attacking_ them?'

'I don't know – it's nothing to do with me. That's what it looked like, though.'

Roland tried to keep his eyes on Eduardo, but he couldn't see much through the crowd of parents and children. Whatever was happening, it seemed to take quite a long time, and it didn't end until Helen appeared on the scene. She stepped onto the playground, looked around for her daughter and then, seeing whatever was happening, she ran to Zora at twice the speed Eduardo had done. There was about a minute more to wait, and then Eduardo returned to the car.

'What the hell happened?' asked Roland.

'Zora was laying into a couple of boys for torturing worms,' said Eduardo, as though he were giving nothing more than a simple observation about the weather. 'She doesn't do stuff like that without a good reason, you know. Listen, I'm going to go to the corner store and see if I can get that twenty dollars. Zora told me she swapped it in there for four fives before she went into school.'

'What twenty dollars?' asked Kevin.

'Secret,' said Eduardo, meeting his nephew's eye in the rear-view mirror and feeling for his wallet at the same time. Then, rifling through the wallet's contents, he asked, 'Roland, do you got five bucks? We can claim it back on expenses.'

'Take ten,' said Roland, offering a crisp ten dollar bill.

'Thanks, man.'

Eduardo got out of the car again, taking his PKE meter this time, and crossed the road to a small shop into which about half the schoolchildren were crowding. When he came back he had Zora's twenty dollar bill, which was still buzzing with residual PKE, and a Kit-Kat for everyone in the car.

~.~

Garrett was sitting in his wheelchair at the kitchen table, scribbling onto a notepad while Kylie watched over the top of his head. She was leaning her arms on the back of his neck as though it were a handy fencepost. This was how Roland and Eduardo found them, and they were laughing.

'Oh, hey,' said Garrett. 'Did you boys have fun?'

'We've been working very hard,' said Roland. 'We got Kevin's teeth _and_ Zora's twenty.'

'How did you get Zora's twenty?' asked Kylie.

'It was all Eduardo,' said Roland. 'I was just the chauffeur.'

'Zora swapped the twenty for four fives in the corner store,' said Eduardo. 'She told me, and I went over there and asked if I could find it and swap it for two tens. That's all – it wasn't so great.'

'Yes it was,' said Garrett. '_I_ can't get a corner store to give me change.'

'Well, I know the store lady. So does Zora.'

'You know everyone on this case,' said Kylie.

'Yeah, they're all real lucky people,' said Eduardo. 'What's all that?'

Kylie looked down at the table, and noticed for the first time that she and Garrett had built up quite a collection of torn-off note pages.

'Well,' she said, 'I wasn't finding anything useful in my research, and Garrett was procrastinating on some reading he's supposed to do for class, so we thought maybe we'd better be useful and try drafting some letters to the tooth fairy – or whatever it is.'

'That's a great idea,' said Roland. 'Let's see what you came up with.'

'Well,' Kylie said, and then she stopped, exchanging a look with Garrett as Roland picked up a piece of paper at random.

' "Dear Tooth Fairy",' he read. ' "You are very weird. What do you want teeth for anyway? I am told that Grandma Rose used to say it's because you build houses out of them. Haven't you ever heard of a hardware store? Yours sincerely, Garrett Miller." '

'Okay, so we started messing around after a while,' said Garrett, beginning to scrabble through some of the papers. 'Where are those early ones? We came up with some good stuff!'

' "Dear Tooth Fairy".' Eduardo had picked up another piece of paper. ' "I am curious to know where you get the money to pay children for their teeth. Is it in fact counterfeit? It's all right – I won't tell anyone. Nor will my boyfriend; _no habla Inglés_. Honest. Yours, Kylie Griffin." '

'Look,' said Garrett, 'those are just –'

'Actually,' said Eduardo, 'I think this one makes a good point. We should have a real good look at that twenty.'

'Your store friend must have been happy enough with it,' said Kylie.

'Maybe they _are_ forgeries,' said Garrett, 'but they're really good. It does happen.'

'Well,' said Kylie, 'I've heard that in the UK, around three percent of pound coins in circulation are fake. Maybe the tooth fairy is responsible for those.'

Roland, having picked up another piece of paper, read, ' "My favorite chicken should vomit everywhere except Roland's house." What the hell is this?'

'That's just a stupid game we started playing when Egon and Janine came up for lunch,' said Kylie. 'Look, why don't we find some of our genuine efforts and see if they're any good?'

'You and Roland do that,' said Garrett. 'I want to see Eddie's twenty – I'm good at money.'

'It's not _my _twenty,' said Eduardo, then made no further objection, and produced the bill from his back pocket.

A few minutes later, the twenty dollar bill was pronounced to be a very good forgery if it was not genuine, with the acknowledgement that Garrett was no expert. Kylie and Roland, meanwhile, had found what was surely the best note among the attempts:

_Dear Tooth Fairy,_

_We have heard through close acquaintance with Kevin Rivera (10) that you recently paid one Zora Stephens $20 for one of her teeth. As you may or may not know, Kevin's mother has been buying his teeth over the years for the measly sum of $x. It now transpires that six of Kevin's teeth have come into our possession, and we would like you to have them for whatever you consider to be a reasonable price. We are having a somewhat difficult time with our dog sledding business, and would be most grateful for any contribution._

_With warmest regards,_

_Messrs Roland Jackson, Garrett Miller and Eduardo Rivera; Miss Kylie Griffin; Ms Janine Melnitz Spengler; Professor Egon Spengler (PhD etc.)_

'This should do fine, with a few alterations,' said Roland, with an older-brotherly frown at Kylie at Garrett.

'Well,' said Kylie, 'we thought we should give her a good reason for wanting to sell Kevin's teeth.'

'_And_ cover up for our being Ghostbusters,' Garrett added.

Roland copied out the note, changing 'x' to '1' (on the advice of Eduardo) and 'dog sledding business' to 'college expenses'. He also rejected the empurpled signatures, and decided not to bring Egon and Janine into the request. The note ended up being signed simply, 'K.G., R.J., G.M., E.R.'

'Elizabeth Regina,' said Garrett. 'Cool. That'll make her pay attention.'

'Should I take this twenty bucks to Egon now?' asked Eduardo.

'Absolutely,' said Kylie. 'And will you take all this crap down to the recycle bin?' She thrust a handful of scrunched notepaper into his arms with a flutter of her eyelids. 'Thanks, sweetie'

~.~

'It's a shame you couldn't have shown me this sooner,' Egon said, when Eduardo presented him with the infamous twenty dollar bill.

'Sorry, man,' said Eduardo.

'Never mind. It could still be useful, and perhaps your plan for tonight will prove successful.'

'Are you any good at telling if money is genuine?'

'I'm sure I could spot an obvious fake,' said Egon, 'but this one looks all right to me. You say you retrieved it from a corner store? They must have been happy to accept it.'

'Yeah, that's what Kylie said. And you're both right.'

'At least you brought me the reading from this straight away,' said Egon. 'Unfortunately I wasn't able to find very much, especially without any actual samples to go with it, but my feeling so far is that we _are_ dealing with some kind of imp or sprite.'

'Or fairy?'

'Possibly.'

'So it's really a tooth fairy?'

'Perhaps,' said Egon. 'I might even go so far as to say that's likely. The readings you gave me are not entirely inconsistent with my old friend Buster's.'

'Who?'

'The tooth fairy the original team encountered some years ago.'

'But they're not exactly the same?' asked Eduardo.

'Well,' said Egon, 'only exact clones have an identical PKE signature. Having said that, these readings are a long way from identical to Buster's. But there's no point in speculating any further until I've looked for trace matter on this twenty dollars.'

'If there is any, or was, I guess it'll be all over Kat's till by now.'

'Who's Kat?'

'The store lady.'

'Oh.'

'Egon...'

'Yes?'

'Suppose we _do_ get a visit from the tooth fairy tonight. What are we going to do – trap her and put her in the containment unit just because she overpaid for a tooth? Or he. Buster was a dude, right?'

'Buster was indeed a dude,' Egon said, looking up from the twenty dollar bill. 'Haven't you thought as far ahead as actually meeting the entity?'

'Well,' said Eduardo, 'I never really thought it could be a genuine tooth fairy. I thought maybe it'd be like an evil spirit who makes kids trust it and then sucks out their souls or something.'

'Perhaps it will be.'

'But what if it _is_ just a really generous tooth fairy?'

'Trap it anyway,' said Egon, 'but don't put it in the containment unit. Then we'll start crossing bridges when we come to them.'

~.~

Evening came, and everyone was reminded very much of the last time they had held a sleep-in to catch a demon. Garrett quickly secured his position on the couch, not knowing that his arch-rival for the position was too preoccupied that time to think of it first. Eduardo was adamant that someone had to be awake at all times, and he was getting Roland to help him figure out a schedule.

'Okay,' Roland announced, when Eduardo was happy with what he'd written on the back of a stray rejected tooth fairy letter. Kylie, on her way to the bathroom, stopped to listen. 'If the first three get their heads down at eleven, we can each take a two-and-a-half-hour watch, and if anyone wants to sleep until nine they'll get more than their eight hours.'

'Why can't we just wait for the PKE meters to wake us like before?' asked Garrett.

'Because we have to keep an eye on the teeth,' said Eduardo, who was on his hands and knees, making up a bed on the floor. 'My brother would kill me if I lost them.'

'Huh,' said Garrett. 'Screw _that_ guy.'

'And Beth would be really upset.'

'Yeah, well... okay then.'

'I'm first watch,' said Roland. 'Eduardo, would it be okay if I had my pen light on? I'd like to get some reading done.'

'I'm not in charge, man.'

'Sure you are,' said Garrett.

'I am _not_!' Eduardo said, sitting back on his heels. 'We're just four Ghostbusters on a case, okay?'

'Well,' said Roland, 'of course we all have an interest in Zora as a client...'

'That's my interest in her too.'

'Okay,' said Garrett, exchanging a look with Roland over the top of Eduardo's head. 'But it _is_ your DNA in those teeth, Eddie. Speaking of which, hadn't you better put them somewhere?'

Eduardo exhaled heavily, for whatever reason, and said, '_Sí_.' Then he stood up, closed his hand around the plastic container in his jeans pocket and looked around for somewhere to put it. He went first to the windowsill, where they had put the note to the tooth fairy. Then he thought he was making it too easy for him or her to get away with the bounty, and so placed it on the coffee table. Like the most serious of chess players, he kept his finger on it for a moment before moving back, and even then he kept his eyes on it.

'They'll be fine,' said Garrett, somewhat irritably. 'Go to bed!'

Eduardo gave himself another moment, then crawled underneath the blankets on the floor. When Kylie came back from the bathroom a few minutes later, she wordlessly lifted the covers and snuggled in next to him.

'Holy mother,' Garrett said, before he could stop himself.

'Problem?' Kylie said pointedly.

'Of course not.'

'Good.'

While the others slept, Roland spent an hour doing some background reading for one of his classes, then he played noughts and crosses with himself for fifteen minutes. When he got bored with that, he read some articles in the TV guide, and for the last half-hour of his watch he went back to his reading. Then, at one thirty in the morning, he woke Garrett.

'Wake up,' he said, shaking him gently. 'Nothing's happened yet.'

'Who says I'm second watch?' Garrett asked sleepily.

'You agreed to it.'

'I did not! You and your bestest buddy Eduardo must have written it on your piece of paper without telling us. So.' He looked at Eduardo and Kylie, over on the other side of the room, and then immediately looked away again. 'Which one of them am I supposed to wake at four a.m.?'

'Eduardo.'

'Why is it me now, anyway? Surely between one thirty and four is exactly when the tooth fairy comes. Eduardo should take this one.'

'Don't say that to him,' said Roland. 'He's no more involved than the rest of us, remember?'

'Yeah, well,' said Garrett, 'I'm terrified of being the one to let Kevin's teeth go.'

'So was I.'

Several yards away, Eduardo and Kylie were snuffling contentedly, their bodies moulded together underneath the blankets.

'I wonder how deeply asleep they are,' Roland said quietly.

'Why?' asked Garrett. He was properly awake now, and hoisting himself into his wheelchair. 'Do you want to talk about them? _I _don't want to talk about them!'

'Well... I _have _been thinking of asking you to lay off the jokes.'

'I already am! Haven't you noticed?'

'Not really... but it's good if you're making an effort. You must know it makes them uncomfortable.'

'_I_ make _them_ uncomfortable?' Garrett's indignation rose a notch. 'Roland, come on – how can you look at them in the same way?'

'They're our friends, and it wouldn't hurt us to be supportive.'

'I am being neither supportive nor unsupportive,' said Garrett. 'It's none of my business, even if it is yours. If they're having problems, I bet Kylie's told you all about it.'

'What do you mean?'

'Just what I say. She tells you stuff – you're like her soul sister. Look, I'm not saying I mind or anything. She doesn't write funny letters to the tooth fairy with you, does she?'

'She hasn't told me anything,' said Roland. 'But I really think that if you're trying to lay off the witty comments... well then, that's a good thing.'

'Go to sleep, Roland.'

~.~

At five to nine in the morning, Kylie woke Eduardo with a kiss. He put his arm around her, and said sleepily, 'Give me a minute.'

'For what?' said Kylie. 'Remember where we are.'

'Huh?' Eduardo took a moment to think, then opened his eyes and sat up quickly. 'What happened?'

'Nothing, sweetie.'

'Nothing?'

'Nothing and nobody came for Kevin's teeth. They're still there. So is our note. Well, it wasn't guaranteed to work, was it?'

'No. It was my idea – it was sure to go wrong.'

'Why would you say that?' Kylie said. 'It was a great idea – it just didn't work out. Unlike some of your ideas.'

'Like what?' Eduardo asked, his tone clearly inviting her to fail to think of an answer.

'Like the idea you had when we were at your place on Saturday night,' she said, and nuzzled his neck until he cheered up. 'I'm definitely taking you home with me tonight, _querido_.'

'That sounds great.'

'It'll blow your mind.'

'I have to go to the bathroom.'

He went, meeting a groggy-looking Slimer on the stairs, as Roland and Garrett began to stir. Once they were sufficiently awake, Kylie told them too that nothing had happened during the final shift of the night, and Kevin's milk teeth were still on the coffee table. No one seemed to have any remark to make, and they were waking up at a leisurely pace when suddenly Janine's arresting tones wafted up from the office.

'What the _hell_ has been going on here?'

Kylie hurried downstairs, still wearing her nightshirt and bootie slippers, with Slimer following. Roland and Garrett hung back, waiting for the bathroom. When Kylie reached the ground floor, the sight that met her eyes was that of Egon and Janine standing in the middle of a sea of sheets of paper, all sizes and colours.

'Kylie, did one of you turn out the recycle bin?' asked Egon.

'Of course not,' said Kylie. 'You don't really think we would, Egon, do you?'

'Well,' said Egon, 'one of you might if you sleepwalked. Sorry, it was just my first thought.'

Eduardo joined them next, and then Roland, in his smiley face pyjamas. Garrett was almost in time to avoid the clearing up. When he rolled out of the elevator, Kylie turned to him with half a sheet of notepaper in each hand and said, 'It's our amusing letters to the tooth fairy. Everything got turned out, but these are ripped or screwed up or scribbled on. All of them. And nothing else.'

'Oops,' said Garrett.

'What does this mean?' Eduardo asked, looking at Egon.

'Well, let's see,' said Egon, who was studying his PKE meter. 'We have a new set of readings... and they're not exactly what you brought me from Zora's apartment. By all indications a tooth fairy of some kind came here, found your letters, got upset and left without taking Kevin's teeth. Now, what ought one to do about that, I wonder?'

'Surely there's nothing we _can _do,' said Garrett. 'Look, shouldn't we just leave it alone? It's not as if this thing's actually done any harm, and besides, I don't see how we can ever find it.'

'Wait a minute,' said Eduardo. 'There must be more to this than a tooth fairy being generous and then getting mad about a few stupid letters. Why are these new readings different from Zora's?'

Egon shook his head. 'I don't know. Perhaps they're two different tooth fairies. That seems to be the simplest explanation.'

'What good is "perhaps"?' Eduardo demanded.

'Eduardo, come on, don't take it out on Egon,' said Kylie, putting a hand on his elbow.

'Well he's not being so _brilliant_ on this case, _is_ he?'

'Nor are you,' said Kylie, withdrawing her hand and glowering at him. 'No one knows where the stupid tooth fairy lives, okay? And I don't have time to try and make you feel better about it – I have a class this morning.'

'Me too,' said Roland. 'I'll drive you.'

'I have to feed Pagan first,' said Kylie, still frowning at Eduardo.

'I'll drive you there too. Come on – we'd better get dressed if we're going to be on time.'

Roland put his hand between Kylie's shoulder blades and steered her gently upstairs. Eduardo, who had slept in his t-shirt and put on his jeans some time ago, looked at Egon and said, 'Sorry, man.'

'You're frustrated,' said Egon. 'I understand.'

'I just don't know what to do.'

'Well, there's always more research to be done, if you feel up to it.'

'Absolutely,' Eduardo said eagerly. 'If it'll really help, I'll do it.'

Garrett scoffed. 'Are you kidding?'

Eduardo ignored him, keeping his eyes on Egon. 'Tell me.'

'I've been looking in the usual places for a precedent,' said Egon, 'but if there has been one, it wasn't recorded as supernatural. There may be something where the supernatural element was overlooked. You could look for anything to do with teeth or other body parts being sold for what seems a disproportionate amount. I'm not sure about the best place to start. Perhaps the history of dentistry.'

'I'm on it,' Eduardo said, and he headed for the nearest computer.

~.~

When most of the local schoolchildren were at recess, Janine received a very strange phone call.

'Hi, Mom, it's Kevin. Listen, did I leave my Aztecs project at home?'

'Sorry, sweetie, you've got the wrong –'

'No, it's okay. Mrs Wilson's letting me use the office phone. I showed my project to Uncle Eduardo, and I think I might have left it on his desk. Can I ask him?'

'Sure, kid,' said Janine. 'Hold on.'

She fetched Eduardo from where he was engrossed in his research on dentistry.

'Your nephew's on the phone talking in code,' she said.

This worried Eduardo enormously, and he hurried to the phone. As Janine watched him, and Kevin said things she couldn't hear, Eduardo's face changed from concern to sheer bafflement. Eventually, he said, 'Listen, man, I'll come down there. Mrs Wilson'll be expecting someone to show up with an Aztecs project anyway, won't she? But you have the real one...? No, don't worry. I'll see you soon.'

Janine sat down at her computer and started designing a cover page for a fake Aztecs project, to put with a wad of scrap paper. Eduardo, meanwhile, put down the phone and went to find Garrett. He was upstairs, out of his wheelchair and on the couch, finally doing his reading for college.

'Kevin just called,' Eduardo said.

'In the middle of school?' said Garrett. 'Is he all right?'

'He spoke Spanish.' As he said this, Eduardo seemed lost in a sea of pride and wonderful surprise. 'I mean, it wasn't very _good_ Spanish, but... I didn't think he knew a word!'

'Okay, and what did he say?'

'I don't know, but it had something to do with _tu chica diente_. How does he know we're working on anything to do with a girl and teeth, though? I didn't tell him.'

'Kids are normally more perceptive than we give them credit for. Or maybe Zora mentioned it to him – I don't know. So what happens now, anyway?'

'I have to take him a fake project so I can find out what he wants to tell me,' Eduardo said. 'Whatever it is, he didn't want to say it in front of Mrs Wilson. Will you come with me?'

'Why?' asked Garrett.

'Because I don't want to be investigating Zora's case on my own. Her mother already thinks I have a personal interest.'

'Well, you do. You like the kid when nobody else does. You told us that on day one.'

'Hey, man, are you coming with me or not?'

'Sure.'

_To be continued..._


	3. Chapter 3

_Extreme Ghostbusters:_** Teeth**

Chapter 3

There was great excitement among the children whose classrooms looked onto the staff car park when the Ecto-1 pulled in. They were even more delighted when they recognised one of the Ghostbusters who alighted from the vehicle; Eduardo was known to everyone at least by sight. It was particularly exciting because this was clearly an official call, with uniforms and PKE meters.

'But no guns, right?' said Garrett.

'Better not,' said Eduardo. 'I'm going to push you up this ramp, okay? They had an inspection last week, and they're supposed to replace the ramp because it's too steep.'

'Well, it does look pretty steep,' said Garrett, as Eduardo grabbed the handles of his wheelchair and began to steer him up the five-metre slope. Once they were at the top, he took over control of the chair and waited for Eduardo to announce himself over the office intercom.

'Hi, Mrs Wilson, it's Eduardo. I've brought Kevin's project.'

'Come on in,' Mrs Wilson said brightly, and buzzed him in.

'Shall I take it to him?' Eduardo asked Mrs Wilson, once they were in the office. 'You look busy. Oh, this is Garrett.'

'Hi, Mrs Wilson,' said Garrett.

'Hello. Yes, go ahead and take Kevin his project. Would Garrett like to wait here?'

'No,' said Eduardo. 'Thank you.'

So it was that Garrett found himself following Eduardo through a book-lined, chalk-smelling corridor which led to the fifth grade classroom. Eduardo knocked on the door, then bundled the fake Aztecs project onto Garrett's lap before letting himself in.

'Hi, Mr Fishman,' he said. 'Sorry to interrupt. Can I please borrow Kevin for a minute?'

'Sure,' said Mr Fishman. 'Kevin?'

Kevin came to join Eduardo and Garrett outside the classroom. As he made his way between the desks, Zora gave a poisonous look to the back of his head, and Eduardo noticed it. He also noticed that his PKE meter beeped, but decided to speak to Kevin before he did anything about it.

'Hi,' said Kevin. 'Look, I don't know if I should really have gotten you all the way down here. It's probably nothing...'

'Tell us,' said Eduardo, crouching down to meet Kevin's eye line.

'Well, at recess – just before I called – Zora was buying teeth from first-graders. She found four of them with loose teeth, and they were wobbling them all through recess, and three out of the four came out by the end. So she bought them for five dollars each.'

'Well, that's great,' said Garrett. 'She's planning on selling them to her fairy – we can catch it!'

'Is _that_ what it is?' asked Kevin. 'A tooth fairy? Who pays _twenty dollars_? Holy crap – why have I been letting Mom buy mine for one?'

'How do you know about all this?' asked Eduardo. 'Did Zora tell you?'

'No, but we all knew she'd come into twenty dollars, and now you've told me why.' He looked uncomfortable. 'You know I don't like telling tales, Uncle Eduardo...'

'Sure,' said Eduardo. 'You learned that from me. But it's just us, Kev. It ain't like you're telling a teacher or something.'

'Well,' said Kevin, 'it wasn't just that she was buying teeth. She was putting a lot of pressure on the kids. I mean, the two boys seemed fine with it, but the girls didn't want to force the teeth to come out before they were ready. But one of them did it, and the other one – it was Katy Clark – couldn't get it to come out and Zora went crazy. She said if Katy didn't have it out by the end of the day, she'd get it out herself.'

'Did you hear her say that?' asked Garrett.

'Yeah. She was making Katy cry, so me and Damon went over to see what was going on.' Damon, as Eduardo knew and Garrett guessed, was Katy's older brother.

'He must have had something to say about all this,' said Eduardo.

'He told Zora if she didn't leave Katy alone, he'd give her a knuckle sandwich,' said Kevin. 'We all thought Zora would say something back, but she didn't – she just walked off. And that was it.'

'Well,' said Garrett, 'it's worth knowing. Maybe we can try and trap the fairy at her apartment.'

'Oh, don't do that!' said Kevin. 'Then she'll know I told!'

'We have to do _something_, Kevin,' said Eduardo. 'This is getting out of hand. And what can we do about Katy? She's a mouse, Garrett – she can never protect herself from Zora.'

'Damon's going to keep an eye on them,' said Kevin. 'So am I. We'll have to watch Zora this afternoon – we're going to the first grade class to hear them read.'

'Again?' said Eduardo. 'Man, Mr Fishman and Miss Ross sure arrange a lot of those.'

'I feel bad about telling,' said Kevin.

'It's okay,' said Garrett. 'You did the right thing.'

Just as he said this, the classroom door flew open and there stood Zora, glaring from Eduardo to Kevin and back again. She didn't seem interested in Garrett. Then something caught her ear. It was the two PKE meters, jumping and blipping excitedly.

'What does _that_ mean?' she demanded.

'We can't tell exactly,' said Eduardo, without even bothering to look. 'Maybe it means you've been talking to your tooth fairy friend lately.'

'Why would you think that? Has _he_ said something?' She jabbed a finger at Kevin.

'Zora, come on!' Mr Fishman called from inside the classroom.

'It's just family stuff,' said Eduardo.

'Mr Fishman says Kevin has to come back in.' She kept her eyes on Kevin, glaring like fury.

'Well, we've finished here,' said Eduardo. 'See you later, Kev. Bye, Zora.'

The two children disappeared back inside the classroom. As soon as the door had shut behind them, Garrett whipped out his PKE meter and said, 'What _is_ this?'

Eduardo, also looking at his meter, said, 'She has residual traces on her. Looks like that's all.'

'But they're different again.'

'So we'll show them to Egon. Listen, I need to stop at the library on the way back.'

'No personal investment at all, huh?' said Garrett.

'Hey, man, can I help it if I'm the only one who knows what to research?'

~.~

Kylie and Roland returned to the firehouse in the early afternoon, and found Eduardo at the kitchen table with a small selection of books and some photocopies of old newspapers. When Kylie saw this, she felt a primal stirring from somewhere deep inside her body. She went to stand behind Eduardo, stooped down a short way and wrapped her arms around his neck.

'Hey, baby,' she said, and kissed him on the cheek.

'Hey.' He didn't look up. Roland, who had been about to leave, decided to stay for the time being.

There was a moment's silence. Then Kylie said, 'What are you reading about?'

'Match factory strikes in the late Nineteenth Century.'

'Oh.' Kylie withdrew her embrace and stood away from him.

'Is it good?' asked Roland.

Eduardo turned a page. 'I don't know yet.'

Kylie stalked out of the room and made her way to the lounge. Roland followed. They found Garrett on the couch, examining some printouts from Egon's computer. These included several PKE readings and pictures of various entities, including Buster the tooth fairy.

'Hi, guys,' Garrett said, looking up from his work. 'Whoa, Ky, what's up with _you_? You look like someone stole your lunch money.'

'He never tells me anything,' said Kylie.

'Well,' said Roland, 'he probably thinks you're not interested in nineteenth-century match factory strikes.'

'Match factory strikes?' said Garrett. 'What the hell? He said he was researching dentistry.'

'No, wait a minute – that makes sense,' said Roland. 'Match factories _did_ have something to do with teeth. Let me think. The factory workers suffered all kinds of bad effects from working with white phosphorous. One of them was definitely something to do with their teeth. I don't think it would have made them go bad, though...'

'It didn't,' Eduardo's voice greeted them from the kitchen doorway. They all turned to look at him as he approached. 'They went bad anyway, because no one had invented toothpaste, and that caused the phosphorous to get down into their jawbones which made them rot, and then they died. They called it phossy jaw. I don't know if I believe it couldn't happen to someone with a full set of teeth, but anyway, that's what they said – and in the eighteen eighties this British company called Bryant and May employed their own dentists to fill holes in the workers' teeth in instead of pulling them.'

'Oh, eww – this stuff freaks me out!' said Roland.

'Well done, Eduardo,' said Kylie. 'What else did you find out?'

'Nothing useful,' said Eduardo. 'Not yet, anyway. Most of the factory girls went to get their teeth pulled anyway, because it was only a little more painful than a filling and much, much quicker. Phossy jaw was one of the reasons the workers went on strike. In the end the factory agreed to use a safer kind of phosphorous, but some dentists started offering fillings anyway, because it was still better for people than having gaps in their teeth. Some of the young ones even started up their own practices if the bosses were too old-school to do fillings. There was other stuff that made the match girls strike as well, but that wouldn't have anything to do with Zora's tooth fairy.'

'Does _any_ of this have to do with Zora's tooth fairy?' asked Garrett.

Eduardo shrugged. 'I don't know.'

'Well,' said Garrett, 'we do have something concrete now, remember.' He looked at Roland and then at Kylie. 'We haven't told you guys what we found out this afternoon. Zora's bought three more teeth to sell to this thing, from kids at school. So that must mean her tooth fairy will be back tonight, with sixty dollars.'

'Maybe not,' said Roland. 'Maybe she's just hoping.'

'She's too smart a businesswoman to take a risk like that,' said Garrett. 'Besides, she's been in contact with something paranormal. Look at these readings – we got them from her this morning.'

'But they're different _again_!' said Kylie. 'Why...? Hey, wait a minute. Where are the readings from the thing that found our funny notes?'

Garrett found the relevant printout, and gave it to Kylie.

'Totally different,' said Kylie. 'But if we look at the reading we got from the apartment in the first place...'

Her train of thought was interrupted when Janine appeared at the top of the stairs, saying, 'Eduardo, Helen Stephens is on the phone, and she really wants to talk to you.'

Eduardo raised his eyebrows. 'Only I'll do, huh?'

'I'm afraid so.'

'All right, I'll talk to her,' and he made his way downstairs.

'What were you saying, Kylie?' asked Roland.

'These two later readings both have similarities to the original one we got,' said Kylie. 'Egon must have noticed that.'

'I'm sure he did,' said Garrett. 'He probably just doesn't know what to do with it. Heck, _I_ don't!'

'Well,' said Kylie, 'is it too obvious to be true? There have been two entities working together, and then they split up. One of them was with Zora this afternoon, and the other one came here last night and messed up the office.'

'That makes sense,' said Roland. 'Something is using Zora to get hold of kids' teeth, and something else is buying them. But those readings weren't on Zora when we first met her. She must have written to the tooth fairy herself in the first place. Then I guess that started it off.'

'It doesn't matter what started it,' said Garrett. 'We can _finish_ it! We'll get Helen to let us stake out this thing at her apartment. Zora, or whoever's controlling her, is obviously expecting it.'

'Well, hold on,' said Roland. 'We tried staking it out before, and we didn't succeed even though it actually came here. And then what about the other entity? We don't know anything about that.'

'Hey, come on, enough talk,' said Garrett. 'We have to try, don't we? And we've got hours yet – Egon can figure out everything.'

'We'll have to do _something_ with this, Roland,' said Kylie. 'It's the best chance we'll have. I'll ask Egon about it... after we hear what Helen had to say. And while we're waiting, Garrett, perhaps you can tell Roland and me _exactly_ what went on at the school.'

It worked out very well. Garrett told Kevin's story, and then Eduardo came back, looking troubled.

'Zora got sent home,' he said. 'Her class were reading with the first-graders, and she got herself put with Katy Clark... you guys don't know her... and she tore out her loose tooth.'

'Oh no, oh wow, don't tell me that!' said Garrett, wincing massively. 'My dad did that to me once. Can you believe it? "Oh, yeah, that's ready to come out," _yoink_!' He shuddered. 'You should _never_ do that. So what did Damon say?'

'He didn't say anything,' said Eduardo. 'He did what he promised: he punched Zora in the nose, and he got detention for a week.'

'Better not ask too much what Miss Ross and Mr Fishman were doing while all this was going on,' said Garrett. 'So I guess Zora didn't get Katy's tooth?'

'Who _are_ all these people?' asked Roland.

'Just school people,' said Eduardo. 'It doesn't matter. Katy got the tooth – and here's the thing. The other three kids decided to tell Miss Ross that Zora had their teeth as well, and Miss Ross made her give them back.'

'Well, there goes _that_ plan right out the window,' said Garrett. 'What about the fifteen dollars? Zora must have demanded her money back.'

'Yes, and Helen has it. She didn't mention the five that Zora would have paid Katy, so neither did I. I guess Zora still has it. But no teeth. I offered to go over there and talk to her, but Helen said she didn't want to do anything else today. She even said we could drop the case if nothing else was going to happen. Why would she say a stupid thing like that, man? There's obviously something very wrong here, and if you ask me, that child is possessed.'

'We were thinking something along those lines,' said Roland. 'There's two different entities at work here. Well, maybe three, but we think the first set of readings we got was the two combined.'

'We'd better tell Egon what we think,' said Kylie.

'I'll do it,' said Eduardo.

~.~

'Indeed,' Egon said, 'it did occur to me that the first entity was the later two combined, or appearing together, at any rate. I'm not blaming you, but all the same I'm sorry the reading you brought me from the school wasn't stronger. Zora couldn't have been actually possessed at the time, but if you think the readings come from something that's been controlling her, I suppose that makes sense.'

'She's not a bad kid, Egon,' Eduardo said.

'Now, what kind of entity is interested in easy ways to make the odd twenty dollars?'

'Beats me. Money's no good to ghosts and demons. Unless maybe they can use a person to help them out with it.'

Egon nodded. 'You're absolutely right.'

~.~

Evening came, and Kylie took Eduardo home with her, just as she had promised. When he emerged from the bathroom at nine fifteen exactly, she had helped herself to his t-shirt and was kneeling at the end of the bed, her arms draped over the metal footboard.

'How come you still have your pants on?' she asked, in seductive tones.

'Because,' said Eduardo, as he made his way towards her, 'I like _you_ to take them off.'

'Mmm, I like that too.'

As soon as he was within reaching distance, she rose up onto her knees and pulled him to her by his goatee. Half protesting and half laughing, he wrapped his arms around her and they began to kiss.

'Are you happy to see me, Eduardo?'

'Yeah...'

'Yeah. Because I'm _really_ happy to see you. I can tell that you – wait, that doesn't feel right.' She lost her sultry tone and dropped back onto her bottom. 'Oh, I know. Is it Kevin's teeth?'

'Huh? Oh, yeah.'

Eduardo's voice returned to normal as he took the plastic container from his jeans pocket. He made his way round to the side of the bed, sat down and examined the collection of six milk teeth, their off-white hue showing clearly through the semi-darkness.

'They're so small,' he said, in wistful tones.

'Mhm.' Kylie knelt behind him, wrapped her arms around his shoulders and chest and began to nibble his left ear.

'I was with him when he lost his first tooth,' Eduardo went on. 'He was trying to break apart a couple of Legos, and it suddenly just flew right across the room. Man, did he freak out!'

Kylie stopped what she was doing and listened.

'He was dismantling my pirate ship. I remember that because my dad gave it to me for my birthday the week before he died.'

'That's sweet,' said Kylie. 'Didn't you mind that Kevin was dismantling it?'

'Nah. When Kev's with me, he can do whatever makes him happy.'

'Oh God, I want you!'

So saying, Kylie took the container of teeth out of Eduardo's hand, put it on the dresser beside them and pulled him down into a prostrate position. She then straddled his waist and began to run her hands and her lips over his body.

'I'm yours, babe,' he murmured. '_Dios_, Kylie, what are you doing to me? _Te deseo, querida_. Oh, don't play with that!'

'I beg your pardon?'

'Pagan's playing with Kevin's teeth,' Eduardo said, meeting Kylie's gaze as he rose up onto his elbows and she onto her knees.

'Oh!' Kylie dismounted, stepped off the bed and crossed the room to where Pagan was batting the plastic bottle around the floor. 'Come on, Pagan, give that to me.'

Within seconds, Kylie had confiscated the new toy and shut it in her dresser drawer.

'Thanks,' said Eduardo.

'Whatever it takes to keep you focused,' said Kylie. 'Are you ready now?'

He answered her by reaching out, grabbing her wrist and pulling her towards him.

~.~

Around three a.m., Kylie was woken from a deep and blissful sleep by a peculiar feeling in her mouth. Her first thought was: What's Pagan doing _now_? Then: That doesn't feel like any part of Eduardo. Barely had she formed this thought when she realised what it _did_ feel like: pain. She sat up, screamed, hit out with both hands and slapped Eduardo in the face.

He, too, began by thinking it must be something to do with Pagan. Then he registered the screaming, and he sat up abruptly. He couldn't see a thing, and his gut reaction was to reach across Kylie and turn the light on. It blinded both of them for some seconds, but anyway it worked. Kylie stopped screaming. The painful tugging sensation in her mouth subsided. Something clattered to the ground, and something else flitted out of sight.

'What's going on?' asked Eduardo. 'Are you okay?'

'I think so,' Kylie said, through unmoving lips, pressing her fingers to her lower jaw. 'Someone or something was trying to pull out one of my teeth!'

'What? Why?'

'I don't know.'

As Kylie's eyes adjusted to the light, she noticed the dresser beside her, and the open drawer. Kevin's teeth had vanished, but she decided not to mention that. She got out of bed and retrieved Eduardo's t-shirt, which one of them – it was hard to remember which – had thrown onto the window seat earlier. She put it on, and the moment her head was freed, she saw her small fridge hurtling towards her face. Too surprised to think of moving out of its way, she screamed again. Then she felt herself pushed to the ground, and looked up just in time to see Eduardo bracing his hands again the fridge as it hit his right flank and sent him crashing into the window seat.

'Oh my God, are you all right?' Kylie cried, running to him.

'It could have been worse,' Eduardo said, sounding like he was in pain. 'Where are my pants?'

'I don't know, sweetie. They can't have gone far. I think we need to get you to a hospital.'

'I think there's something else we need to do first.'

'Well... what can we do without our equipment?'

'Not so tough without it, eh?' a voice said. 'Look at you, girl! You're nothing but a whore.'

It was a harsh and snakelike, but unmistakably feminine, voice. Kylie was too stunned to speak, but Eduardo managed to lift his head and say, 'Hey, man, watch it!'

'It's okay, babe, I've got this,' said Kylie. Then she addressed the empty space in front of her. 'So what are you saying – that you steal teeth from emancipated women? That doesn't make any sense!'

'Your being a whore has nothing to do with it. It was merely an observation.'

Just as the thing finished speaking, the microwave unplugged itself from the wall socket and flew across the room towards Kylie's jaw. She managed to duck this time, and the appliance went crashing through the window.

'Oh my _God_!' Kylie screeched. 'You complete bitch! My landlady's going to kill me!'

'Does she know you entertain gentleman callers after dark?'

'Hey, man, stop talking to her like that,' said Eduardo.

'So,' said the voice, 'he _does_ speak English.'

'What?' said Kylie. 'Oh, wait. You're upset about those stupid letters we wrote? Look, that was just a joke – unlike what you're doing to Zora. What _are_ you doing to her, anyway?'

'It's just a business arrangement.'

'You're evil,' said Kylie, beginning to move across the room, trying to follow the sound of the voice. 'I don't exactly understand what you're doing, but you're definitely evil!'

Behind her, Eduardo was staggering around and trying to put on his jeans without exacerbating the pain in his side, which was proving impossible. Trying to ignore his huffs and grunts, Kylie carried on looking for the intruder. The voice, she was sure, had come from underneath the dresser by the bed. She moved this aside, and at once a thing the size of a large moth flitted up and out of sight.

'So you really _are_ a fairy!' said Kylie, trying to follow the thing with her eyes. She was thinking that she could never have caught it even if she had happened to have a proton gun and ghost trap, when suddenly Pagan appeared as if out of nowhere. Kylie neither heard nor saw him until he had landed heavily on the ground, with the fairy beneath his front paws.

'Oh, good boy, Pagan!' said Kylie.

'Meow,' said Pagan, swelling with pride and blinking up at Kylie. Then he began to play.

'Oh my God.' Kylie stepped back, reaching behind her for Eduardo, and holding tightly onto his hand when he offered it. 'I think he's broken her wings.'

The fairy's screams were horrible to witness. Eduardo and Kylie could only watch in morbid fascination as Pagan let her crawl away from him, then pounced again and began to knock the fairy around like a hockey puck. This he did three or four times, and each time her attempt to escape became more laboured.

'Should we stop him?' Eduardo said at last.

'Well,' said Kylie, 'I... I think she's dead!'

Pagan moved back from his quarry, batted it with a tentative forepaw and looked disappointed when it didn't move. Then he approached the corpse, gave it a good sniff and finally bit the head off.

'Definitely dead,' said Eduardo. 'Oh, _madre de Dios_, that's disgusting!'

Pagan had now bitten the fairy's head in half, and was licking the brains from her skull with a most graphic slurping sound. Then he moved onto the body, devouring it bit by bit, occasionally spitting out a mouthful of net-like clothing and then trying to smack the taste off his tongue. Eduardo and Kylie both watched, sickened, unable to look away. Eduardo finally turned from the scene when Pagan bit a hole in the abdomen and started sucking up the intestines like spaghetti.

'And I thought he was so cute,' he said, making his way slowly and painfully towards the bed.

'You need to go to the hospital,' said Kylie.

'No I don't – I'll be fine.' He eased himself onto the mattress and lay down flat on his back.

'But you're obviously –' then she cut herself off with a gasp. 'Oh my gosh! Garrett!'

'What about Garrett?'

'We wrote the letters together! Suppose she got to him first.'

'And what, he's lying there in agony with all his teeth pulled out?'

'Oh, don't say that!'

'Sorry,' said Eduardo. 'I didn't mean to freak you out. I can't see Garrett letting that happen.'

'Maybe not,' said Kylie, 'but will you please call him?'

'Why me?'

'Because I have to go down to the street and get the microwave. And I'd better clear up the broken glass as well, hadn't I? The fridge can stay where it is for now – I can't be bothered with it.'

Kylie put on a pair of sweats and her combat boots, then retrieved a bin liner from one of the cupboards that ought to have been beside the fridge and underneath the microwave. The communal corridors of the house and the street outside were sufficiently well lit for her not to need a torch. Eduardo waited for her to leave before he laboured into an upright position and reached for the phone. That was hard enough, but dialling was worse. He couldn't lean over so he had to do it with his right hand, which was also holding the receiver, almost without looking.

'Wha...?' Garrett's voice answered.

'Hey, man, it's Eduardo.'

'Wha...'

'I'm really sorry. Kylie wanted me to call you.'

'W... why...'

'We had a visit from the tooth fairy,' Eduardo explained. 'Probably Zora's, but... who the hell knows? She was _loco_ about the letters you guys wrote, and she tried to knock Kylie's teeth out with the fridge and the microwave. So Ky thought we'd better check she hadn't gotten to you first.'

'Well... is she okay?' asked Garrett, incredulous.

'Yeah, she's fine.'

'Good. So what happened to the fairy? She's gone, right? You don't even have any equipment.'

'No, actually, Pagan ate her.'

There was a pause. Then Garrett, with a laugh in his voice, said, 'Seriously?'

'He seriously ate her. It was gross, man.'

'Well, that's great! Listen, I'm fine – I guess Pagan saved me – but what happened to _you_?'

'Me?' said Eduardo, his voice catching as he breathed in painfully. 'Nothing happened to me.'

'You sound like you're in pain.'

'I'm just tired. It's really late, man – go to sleep, okay?'

'Um, okay,' Garrett said.

Eduardo hung up and, with some difficulty, lay down flat again. Normally he slept on his side, but that was now out of the question. He felt bad about not helping Kylie to fetch her microwave and the broken glass from the street below, but that was also out of the question. So was trying to retrieve Kevin's teeth from Pagan. Eduardo knew the cat had them; a quiet rattling sound indicated that he was playing with them at that moment, triumphant in his victory over their stealer.

~.~

Kylie's alarm went off at seven o'clock. Eduardo shifted, and possibly even tried to turn over, then stopped himself with a gasp of pain. Kylie got up, fed Pagan and showered. Then she went down to the basement of the house and found some old boxes with which to board up the broken window. That done, she plugged in her microwave and tested it with a paper cup of instant soup from the capsized fridge. To her relief, the microwave lit up and the soup began to spin. Kylie then crossed the room and set about dragging the fridge across the floor.

'Oh, let me do that,' Eduardo said, beginning to sit up. 'Ow!'

'What _would_ I do without men around to help me?' said Kylie. 'How are you feeling?'

'I feel fine. What's that?'

'What, babe?'

Eduardo tried to point, found it hurt him and nodded instead.

'Oh.' Kylie went over to the small mass of something in the corner of the room. 'If you really want to know, sweetie, it looks like a stomach, a little bit of intestine and half a head. Skull licked clean.'

'Nice.'

'Have this,' said Kylie, when the microwave had pinged, and she handed him the heated-up soup. Eduardo took a sip, then wished he hadn't when he witnessed what Kylie did next. She took a clear plastic sandwich bag from a drawer under the microwave, crossed the room, put her hand into the bag and scooped up what was left of the tooth fairy. Then she started having a very good look at it.

'You're not going to throw that out?' asked Eduardo.

'Of course not. Egon needs to analyse it.'

'Well, I'm sure he'll enjoy that.'

Pagan trotted out of the bathroom, where he had been lapping up the drops of water still in the shower, and sat down in the middle of the floor to wash himself.

'Wow,' said Eduardo. 'Ky, he looks... misshapen.'

'What?' Kylie stopped examining the stomach and half a head in her bag, and turned to look at Pagan. He looked very much as usual, apart from a bulge almost half the size of the rest of his body, which protruded from his left flank. 'Oh, that's okay. He looks just like that whenever he eats a bird. The first time, I was afraid the bones had ruptured his stomach or something, but I looked it up and it's fine. Y'know, he can digest _any_ animal matter, like bones and hair. Can't you, sweetie?'

'Prrrrr,' said Pagan, rolling over and showing all of his nipples.

'What about fairy matter?' asked Eduardo. 'Does that count?'

'Hmm.' Kylie looked again at Pagan, and this time concern crept into her voice. 'You're right. Is it okay for him to eat fairies? I'd better get Egon to take a look at him. I'll call Roland to pick us up.'

'I'll do that,' said Eduardo, who was beginning to realise that he needed to go to the bathroom, and wanted to put it off for as long as possible. 'You need to eat something.'

'I'll have the rest of that soup if you don't want it,' said Kylie, and she did, realising quickly that she perhaps ought not to have heated it straight from an unplugged fridge. 'I guess you'll need help getting the rest of your clothes on.'

'No, I'm fine,' Eduardo said, and to prove it he wriggled to the edge of the bed, trying not to wince.

'Stop that,' said Kylie as, with gritted teeth, he put his feet on the ground and picked up the phone in his left hand. 'You have to go to the hospital.'

'No I don't.'

'Yes you do – don't be such a baby.'

'What if I told you you _had_ to do _anything_?'

'If I'm ever hit in the ribs with a flying refrigerator,' said Kylie, 'you can tell me I have to go to the hospital. Ask Roland to take you.'

'I bet you're just worried I won't be able to give you your kicks for a while.'

'I know for sure that you won't.' Kylie frowned, but then decided to go easy on him because he was in pain. 'I'm worried about you. Not you and me; not your performance in the bedroom; _you_!'

Eduardo didn't say anything. Kylie walked over to the bed and crouched down in front of him.

'I hate seeing you in pain,' she said, and gently kissed his bruised right side.

'Ky.'

'Mmmm...?'

'What happened to Kevin's teeth? Pagan definitely had them after the he ate the tooth fairy.'

'Oh.' Kylie looked around the room, but she couldn't see the bottle of teeth. 'Well, don't worry – I know most of his hiding places. I think.'

Having said this, she ducked under the bed. Within moments she crawled back out again with the bottle of teeth in one hand and a nasty looking metal implement in the other.

'Now, what on earth would this be?' she asked, holding out the unfamiliar object.

Eduardo recognised it at once. 'It's a tooth pulling gizmo from the eighteen eighties.'

'Really?' Kylie knelt in front of him and stared at the thing in her hand. 'It looks medieval!'

She was right about that. The thing had a corkscrew-like handle, a grotesquely bent shaft and a rusty screw in the bottom that held the grip. This was a near-perfect semi-circle which moved on a hinge, and on the end of it were three jagged points obviously designed for taking a tight hold.

'Seriously!' Kylie put one hand to her mouth and the other on her stomach. 'She was trying to use that on me last night, wasn't she? God, that freaks me out.'

'But she didn't manage,' said Eduardo, putting his hands on her arms. 'You still got all your teeth.'

'She actually touched me with it! Oh, eww – my mouth feels weird!'

'I got the same thing when I was reading about this stuff, and looking at the diagrams. It'll pass.'

'Well.' Kylie rose up a little on her knees and wrapped her arms around his neck. 'Let's see if we can do anything about it right now, shall we?' She started to kiss him, murmuring as she moved her lips over his, 'Why do you think you're not smart, hmm? I bet you know everything about dentistry now, don't you? You're just... you're so...'

'Kylie, please.' He grabbed her wrist and stayed her right hand, which had begun moving over his chest, while her sentence got lost somewhere near his collarbone. 'Don't get me excited.'

She looked up and smiled sheepishly. 'Sorry.'

'Hey, let me get another look at that thing. Maybe it's monogrammed.'

Kylie was still holding the foul device in her left hand, which was draped over Eduardo's shoulder. She brought the thing into view, and handed it to him.

' "H. Gunson and co",' he read, finding the carving on the handle straight away, the letters picked out in a chipping black paint. 'That sounds kind of familiar.'

'Well, that could tell us everything. Eduardo, you're a genius!'

'I can't remember what I read about them. And anyway it might not mean anything.'

'Well, _I_ have faith in you.' She kissed him again, then twisted round and picked up the phone. 'Now will you _please_ ask Roland to take you to the hospital? I want to get you fixed, even if you don't.'

~.~

Roland came to get them as quickly as he could. Kylie put Pagan's carrier on the back seat of the car, then strapped Eduardo into the front because he was struggling with it.

'It's just a rib injury,' Eduardo said, not much liking having to be strapped in. 'Everyone knows they heal easy, and you just have to take painkillers and wait. I don't need to go to the hospital.'

'You got hit with a refrigerator,' said Kylie.

'Only a little one.'

'Anyway, you need a prescription, don't you?'

'No. I'd be fine right now if you kept your bathroom cabinet properly stocked.'

'Yes, it's a good thing I looked,' said Kylie. 'Tonight we'll go to the store and buy all the painkillers we're allowed. In the meantime, it would make me feel much better if you went to the hospital, because I've heard that it's serious if you break more than three ribs and you were _hit by a fridge_!'

'So,' said Roland, once Kylie was in the back with Pagan and they could set off. For all of twenty seconds, he had been dying to know how Eduardo was hit in the side by a fridge. 'What happened?'

Kylie told him. Then she said, 'Eduardo, show him the thing.'

'What thing?' asked Roland, already feeling a little queasy from the story so far. When Eduardo pulled out the tooth extractor, he almost crashed the car. 'That's horrible – put it away!'

'Give it to me, babe,' said Kylie, reaching between the two front seats, 'and I'll give it to Egon.'

'Oh my God,' said Roland, his stomach turning over as Kylie gripped the hinge of the instrument and it moved, under protest. 'It squeaks and everything!'

'I'd call it more of a creak,' said Eduardo, beginning to enjoy himself for the first time since about half past eleven the night before. 'The screw is rusty, so it must be –'

'Stop it!' said Roland.

'That's lucky for me,' said Kylie. 'If she took better care of this thing, she might have actually gotten my tooth out with it.'

'You have the bag of organs, right?' said Eduardo. 'Shall I show him that too?'

'If you're not careful,' said Roland, 'I really will crash the car.'

'Sorry, Roland,' said Kylie, who had succumbed at last to Eduardo's ability to make her smile, in spite of all her anxiety. 'I'll tell him. Eduardo, stop talking about the interesting things I had in my mouth last night, and let's all keep our organs to ourselves.'

Eduardo gasped, braced forward and said, in strained tones, 'Don't make me laugh!'

'Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry!' said Kylie.

'Here we are, Kylie,' said Roland, as he pulled up outside the firehouse. 'Get in there and see if you can grow up.'

'Yes, Dad,' said Kylie. Then she leaned over the seat to kiss Eduardo, getting her hair in Roland's face, and said, 'Don't worry, sweetie – you'll be fine.'

She got out with the cat carrier, the sandwich bag and the tooth extractor. Roland drove on.

'Are you worried?' he asked Eduardo. 'I'm sure there's no internal bleeding or anything, which is very lucky, if this happened hours ago. You should have called me right away.'

'I don't like hospitals.'

'I don't think anybody really _likes_ hospitals, Eduardo.'

'I hate them. I'm only going for Kylie.' Then he turned to look out of the window as he added, in enigmatic tones, 'She wants me "fixed".'

'I'm sure we all want you fixed,' Roland said, then wondered if he had included himself in some kind of euphemism. He went on hurriedly, 'So anyway, what does this mean for Zora?'

'Oh, _María Madre de Dios_!' said Eduardo. 'I shouldn't be going to the hospital – I should be going to see Zora!'

'No, you should be going to the hospital. The others can concentrate on Zora. So what do you think it means, anyway, Pagan eating this fairy?'

'I don't know, man – you're the smart one.'

'Well,' said Roland, 'it's got to mean something for this other entity, hasn't it?'

'Like what?' asked Eduardo. 'It decides to give up and leave Zora alone? It gets so mad that it kills her? Turn around – we have to go see her.'

'I won't,' said Roland. 'Look, how about this? I'll drive to her house while you're in the hospital.'

'She'll be at school by then, and you can't go there without me – they'll think you're a paedophile.'

'Well, now you're just making excuses.'

'It's true.'

'I guess it is,' said Roland, with a sigh. 'All right, I'll call Janine from the hospital, and I'll ask her to call Zora's mom and find out how she is.'

'Did Helen give us her work number?'

'She must have.'

'I don't think she did.'

'For heaven's sake, Eduardo, you are going to the hospital whether you like it or not!'

_To be continued..._


	4. Chapter 4

_Extreme Ghostbusters:_** Teeth**

Chapter 4

Garrett had a class that morning, but Janine was expecting the other three young Ghostbusters. She was therefore surprised so see only Kylie, complete with an occupied cat carrier and a handful of very puzzling objects.

'What happened to Eduardo?' asked Janine. She didn't expect Kylie to know about Roland.

'Roland's taking him to the hospital.'

'Why does he need to go to the hospital?'

For the second time that morning, Kylie told the whole story, knowing that she would shortly have to do so again for Egon. Janine seemed mildly interested in the tooth fairy, and tittered by the climax of her being eaten by Pagan, but more than anything she was interested in Eduardo's injury.

'Hit in the ribs by a refrigerator, huh?'

'Just a small one. Sort of... that big.' She indicated with her hands.

'Big enough to do some damage, then. I bet you he'll be out of commission for at least a week. No physical strain whatsoever.'

'Well... I guess.'

'How would you feel about that?' asked Janine, with a significant look. 'Disappointed?'

'Of course, kind of – but if I've been adding up my dates right, the timing won't be too bad.'

'And that's the only reason you're not totally cut up about it?'

'What? Sorry, Janine, I can't crack this code. What are you getting at?'

'I'm just thinking,' said Janine, 'that if you have to put the physical stuff on hold for a while, maybe it'll give you a chance to figure out your feelings.'

Kylie made a face. 'I have no patience with people who have to mooch around trying to figure out their feelings. Uh... no offence.'

'None taken. I've always been absolutely positive of my feelings. You, on the other hand, seem to have been trying to figure yours out for a year. But I guess that isn't _so _long, relatively speaking.'

'Well, it's not _my _fault my boyfriend's a closed book,' said Kylie. 'Anyway, I'm not mooching around at all. I am taking my cat and this Victorian tooth extractor and this bag of leftover pieces of fairy, and I am showing them to Egon. I'll see you later.'

Kylie went, and Janine returned to the magazine she was reading. For a while she amused herself by filling in an idiotic questionnaire. Slimer interrupted her at one point, making indignant noises because the sight of him had alarmed Pagan into growling and hissing and raising his hackles.

'Don't take it personally, Slimer,' Janine told him, when she had figured out what he was trying to say. 'Cats are very suspicious animals. You don't want to make friends with someone like that.'

Slimer was thinking this over when the phone rang. Janine, not relishing the idea of being in charge of Slimer and Pagan while Kylie and Egon went out on a job, picked up the receiver and said tentatively, 'Hello, Ghostbusters.'

It was Roland, asking her to call Helen Stephens.

'We do have a work number for her, don't we?' he asked.

'Yes,' said Janine, 'I made her give me that the first time she called. How's Eduardo?'

'It's like taking my little brother to the dentist. He's just filling out his forms. So you'll call Helen?'

'Sure,' said Janine, and she did.

'Hello, Ms Stephens – it's Janine Spengler, from the Ghostbusters. I need to let you know that we, um, incapacitated a tooth fairy last night, and we're pretty sure it's the one that was bothering Zora. We're just waiting for Egon's confirmation.'

'Well, that's wonderful,' said Helen. 'Thank you so much. If you just send an invoice in the mail...'

'It'll be with you in the next few days,' said Janine. 'I just have a few follow-up questions for you, Ms Stephens, if you don't mind. How is Zora now?'

'She seemed fine when she went to school this morning.'

'Did she seem happy?'

'Well, not exactly _happy_, but that's because she's still upset about that fifteen dollars. I put it in a collecting tin this morning. But that's just her way. She seemed normal when I dropped her off.'

'Well, thank you,' said Janine. 'You'll call us if anything else happens, won't you?'

'Why would anything else happen?'

'No reason at all, Ms Stephens. Have a nice day now.'

~.~

'Janine's calling her,' said Roland, taking a seat beside Eduardo.

'So what if something's wrong?' asked Eduardo. 'How'll we know?'

'We won't. Egon and Kylie will deal with it.'

'I guess.' Eduardo looked up – he was hunched over his forms – and saw that Roland seemed settled. 'You don't have to stay, man.'

'You need your chauffeur, don't you?' said Roland. 'So what are you going to say when they ask you how it happened?'

'I'll say someone threw an appliance at me. Doctors know if you're lying about your injuries, and they start threatening to call the police, but they'll be fine with me getting attacked with a fridge. In a minute, will you call Janine again and find out what Helen said?'

'Well... okay.'

'And give these to the nurse?' Eduardo handed Roland his forms.

'Sure.'

Roland went, gave in the forms and called Janine on the payphone. A minute later, he was back.

'Helen says that Zora seemed normal when she went to school this morning.'

'Okay,' said Eduardo, not sounding particularly satisfied. 'Hey, man, why don't you get that nurse's number? I think she likes you.'

'What on earth makes you think that?'

'I don't know. I got a feeling. She's hot – you should ask her. What's the worst that could happen?'

'Uh, maybe,' said Roland. 'So... about Zor- '

'What?'

'Well.' Roland thought quickly. The truth was, he had nothing else to say on the matter, at least for the time being. 'I'm just wondering about that horrible tooth extractor thing. It didn't belong to the fairy in the first place, did it? It must have come from a dental practice at some point.'

Eduardo nodded. 'H. Gunson and co. I definitely read something about them, but I must not have thought it was important. I wish I could remember...'

'Well, try,' said Roland. 'We don't have anything to do but sit here for a while. What else were you reading about at the time? Was it the match factories?'

'I don't know. Yes. Was H. Gunson the one where the junior dentists all left him to set up their own practice, and they did fillings when he wouldn't?'

'_All_ the junior dentists left?' asked Roland. 'Really?'

'There were only about three,' said Eduardo. 'I think. They didn't want to work for this dude because he had a bad reputation. Or am I mixing this up with something else?'

'Maybe, but we're only talking about it. Go on. What was wrong with Gunson?'

'He kept pulling the wrong teeth.'

'The wrong teeth? What...? Oh.' Roland started to look a little sick. 'You don't mean...'

'He missed the rotten ones and pulled out good ones.'

'Oh my... Okay.' Roland took a moment to gather himself. 'So naturally people stopped going to him, right?'

'They must have.'

'And at some point, a tooth fairy – who was at best a ruthless businesswoman and at worst evil – ended up with one of his extractors.'

'That's about the size of it.'

'Mr Rivera?' The hot nurse at reception cut into their conversation. 'The doctor will see you now.'

'Don't look like that, Eduardo,' Roland said, as Eduardo got to his feet, his dislike of hospitals more evident in his face than the pain he was feeling. 'It's not like he or she will be pulling teeth.'

~.~

'He's certainly got a nice ecto afterglow, hasn't he?' said Kylie.

'Well,' said Egon, who was running his PKE meter over Pagan, 'that's to be expected, I suppose.'

Pagan was very suspicious of Egon, but with Kylie holding onto his sides and circling her fingers in his fur, he was taking it quite well. Just once, when Egon's back was to them, he turned his head and give Kylie a look which clearly said, _Well this was a stupid idea of yours!_

'I don't believe he's suffered any ill-effects,' Egon said.

'Thank goodness,' said Kylie, picking Pagan up and cuddling him.

As she spoke, Egon's telephone rang with the tone of an internal call. Egon picked it up, motioning for Kylie not to go anywhere.

'Hello,' he said. 'I see... Yes, I did want to know that – thank you for telling me... Yes, Pagan's fine... Janine, please!' He went rather pink. 'Not while we're working... Yes, well, that sounds... most pleasant. I'll tell Kylie what you just told me. I'll see you later... I love you too.'

He hung up. Kylie stood there holding Pagan to her chest, while Pagan licked her hand and purred.

'That was Janine,' Egon said unnecessarily. 'She told me that Eduardo got Roland to call her and ask her to call Helen Stephens to find out how Zora was. You might like to know that Zora seemed fine, so Helen said.'

'Well,' said Kylie, 'that's good. But then Helen also said we could call off the investigation when we... well, Eduardo was sure something was really wrong. Maybe we should try to see Zora today.'

Egon nodded. 'I agree with you. We'll need Eduardo for that, as she's at school. We'll get him to pretend Kevin forgot a binder or something.'

'Poor Kevin. We'll get him into trouble for always forgetting things.'

'Perhaps, but I'd rather not wait any longer than we have to. I'm sure there is or was a second entity involved, and goodness knows what it's doing after all this. Now then.' He thought for a moment. 'I don't suppose _you're_ known to the school, Kylie, as an adult in Kevin's life?'

'I've never been to the school, Egon,' said Kylie. 'Sorry.'

'Don't apologise. We'll just have to wait. What else can you tell me about this fairy?'

'Well, let's see. She'd fit nicely into a chicken egg, and she had the traditional pretty dress on, and she had telekinetic powers, and her attitude toward my boyfriend being there was very Victorian.'

'And she was after your teeth?'

'It seems so. At least one of them, anyway. I guess she might have killed me with the fridge, or even the microwave, but I don't think she'd have meant to. She mentioned something in one of the stupid letters me and Garrett wrote, so it had to be the same entity that came here, right?'

'Yes,' said Egon. 'The readings from everything you've brought me indicate that this fairy was the one who had dealings with Zora. It seems odd that she wanted your teeth – I would have theorised that tooth fairies are only interested in milk teeth. Then again, milk teeth are an awful lot easier to come by. Perhaps they just take what they can get.'

'Maybe she wasn't really a tooth fairy,' said Kylie. 'Maybe she was just nuts.'

'I don't suppose we'll ever know now.'

'I guess not. Now, I'd better get Pagan out of here – he wants to play with some of your equipment.'

She took Pagan upstairs, and he started clawing the upholstery on the couch so Kylie sat down, picked him up and put him onto her lap. He watched as she picked up the remote control, turned on the TV and began to flip through the channels. Then, when she found a show about antiques, he decided to settle down in the hammock of her skirt.

'Good boy,' said Kylie, stroking him, and together they watched the antiques show. Kylie found it mildly diverting, although she couldn't help worrying about Eduardo in the hospital. When the TV show finished, Pagan looked displeased with the news round-up that followed. Kylie stroked him, in the hope he wouldn't wander off, and began talking to him.

'Did you hear that Janine asked after you?' she said. 'Everybody loves you, don't they? Janine loves you, and Roland loves you, and Kevin loves you, and Eduardo loves you... Pagan?' She stopped, lifted Pagan's chin and looked into his eyes. 'Do you love Eduardo?'

To her enormous surprise, Pagan answered this question with a yowl of distress. A moment later, Kylie felt her body whipped round a hundred and eighty degrees. Her chest impacted heavily with the back of the couch, and Pagan was torn from her arms with the force of a hurricane.

'PAGAN!' Kylie screamed, in a voice to wake the dead and stoke the deepest fires of Hell. At the very least, it brought Egon and Janine both running up the stairs, and there they stood while Kylie clambered over the back of the couch, wide-eyed with terror. In the middle of them stood a ten-year-old girl with a terrified cat in her arms and a brilliant red light burning in her eyes.

'The cat,' said Zora, in a voice that was definitely not her own, 'will pay.'

~.~

It turned out that Eduardo had three broken ribs, which happened to be Kylie's maximum for a safe injury. The doctor prescribed some strong painkillers and told him to take them whenever he felt uncomfortable, as it was important for him to keep breathing and coughing normally, and of course not to exceed the stated dose. Roland then drove Eduardo to the pharmacy, and he came out surprisingly quickly, taking something with a pint of semi-skimmed milk and a Snickers bar.

'You didn't pick up your prescription,' said Roland. 'Don't try and tell me you did – you weren't in there long enough.'

'There's no time to wait around for a prescription right now,' said Eduardo. 'I'll get it later. I just bought some of the normal stuff over the counter. Now can we get out of here, please? Maybe we should go see Zora at school. No, wait, I don't have a project or anything for Kevin. Mrs Wilson'll just think I'm being weird.'

'We don't have any equipment anyway,' said Roland. 'Not even a PKE meter.'

'Oh yeah. We'd better go to the firehouse, then.'

'Maybe Egon will have something to tell us. Like whether Pagan's really all right.'

'Pagan's fine,' said Eduardo, as Roland started the car. 'He doesn't need Egon to check him for ghost diseases, just like I didn't need to go to the hospital. All this fuss, man, it's driving me nuts!'

'It's because she cares,' said Roland. 'You know that.'

'I'm not blaming Kylie,' said Eduardo. 'You made me go to the hospital almost as much as she did, and something I said made her worry about Pagan, so that was my fault. Poor guy. He'd have much rather stayed home and slept, and he's got this bowlful of stuff that's supposed to be good for his teeth, which he really – oh, I just remembered something!'

'What's that?' asked Roland.

'That dentist, H. Gunson. Let me think. After the other dentists all left him, and everyone stopped coming to his practice, he sold up and bought another place somewhere else. I remember because his name came up more than once, in some old medical journals. He ended up with at least four different dental practices, and every time he lost business and had to move.'

'Because he pulled the wrong teeth?' Roland asked, again turning a little queasy.

'Probably. These days he'd be struck off and they'd put him all over the news, but they didn't have stuff like that in those days, especially for the illiterate masses.'

'That's such a good point.'

'Don't sound so surprised.'

'Sorry,' said Roland. 'Anything else?'

'If I'd read anything about him getting rich,' said Eduardo, 'I'd have remembered that, because it would fit in with what Zora's been doing. This is just an idea, but he could have sold the teeth to this fairy, couldn't he? I mean, it makes sense that there'd be something in it for him, pulling out healthy teeth. Otherwise he'd try harder not to do it, wouldn't he?'

'You would think.'

'I didn't read anything about him making a lot of money, but why would I? It was all just about dentistry. They wouldn't know or care if the guy kept a load of cash in his mattress.'

'All right, so according to your theory, Zora wrote a letter to the tooth fairy asking for more money, and then Gunson and your fairy from last night – possibly an established partnership – got together to try and get all the milk teeth from Kevin's school for _her,_ and she'd pay _him_ twenty dollars apiece. Via Zora. She couldn't really have been going to use genuine money, could she? All those teeth!'

'I don't know,' said Eduardo. 'It doesn't matter. She's dead. The question is, what's Gunson doing?'

'Are we so sure it's actually him?'

'No, but why else would she have his tooth extractor? And why else was he such a shitty dentist?'

'Well,' said Roland, 'it does seem to make sense. We'll run it by Egon.'

He was right – it seemed the only thing to do for the time being – but Eduardo was itching to find the fairy's accomplice, be it H. Gunson or no, and deal with him.

~.~

The moment the Mustang pulled into the firehouse, Eduardo's wish was granted. He opened the passenger door, and if he had never before heard a scream that was actually blood-curdling, he heard one now. What was more, he recognised the voice as Kylie's, and he ran like fury. His three broken ribs would not have hindered him even if he hadn't just taken two paracetamol.

Eduardo arrived at the top of the stairs, and took in the scene at a glance. Zora was there, emitting light from her eyes. Egon was looking helplessly at a proton pack too far away to reach. Janine was looking at the back of Zora's head, clearly contemplating sneaking up on her. Kylie was clutching a corner of the couch and shaking with terror. Pagan was yowling and struggling in Zora's grip. She had her left arm around his upper body, almost strangling him, and in her right hand was a Victorian dental drill.

Roland, coming up behind Eduardo, noticed the drill first and almost fainted. It was a rusty collection of wheels, points and levers. It was difficult to tell what Zora's possessor planned to do with it, and no one wanted to find out. Eduardo's mouth worked faster than his mind, as he found himself yelling, 'Zora, don't let him do it!'

The right hand stopped moving, and the red eyes flashed up to look at him.

'Zora's not here,' said a voice, half Victorian London dentist and half demon.

'Sure she is,' said Eduardo. 'Zora, I _know_ you're in there! You have to fight him!'

'You have no idea who or what I am!'

'Don't I, _muchacho_? Your name's all over your equipment, man.'

There was a monogram on the drill as well as the extractor, too small and too far away to read, but it was definitely there. The whole face looked up this time, not just the eyes, and the mouth emitted a furious hissing sound.

'See, Zora?' Eduardo went on. 'The guy's an idiot! _Que es un idiota, sí_?You don't have time for idiots. Come on, Zora, listen to me! _Escúchame_! Just the other day those hands beat up two boys for torturing earthworms. I _know_ they're not going to hurt an innocent cat!'

At these words, the red glow began to dim, and Zora dropped her right hand. Pagan continued to struggle, and at last he managed to free himself. He dug his claws into Zora's shoulder to clamber out of her grip, then pushed himself off from her chest with his powerful back legs. It was an uncomfortable experience, as Eduardo knew from holding Pagan still while Kylie gave him his flea treatment. H. Gunson emitted another hiss, and underneath this Zora's voice could be heard.

'Oof!' she said, as Pagan kicked against her heart and lungs. Then he ran underneath the couch and cowered there. Kylie got onto her hands and knees and peered at him. Egon ran for the proton pack. Roland kept his eyes on the drill, still in Zora's hand. Janine shouted, 'Eduardo, keep going!'

'Fight him, Zora!' Eduardo cried. 'You don't have to keep taking people's sh- um, crap! Fight him! _Luchar contra él_, Zora!'

It was impossible to tell whether the Spanish made any difference, but at any rate something worked. There was a small explosion around Zora; her eyes stopped glowing, and she fell forward, dropping the drill with a clatter. Eduardo did a rather spectacular knee slide across the floor and caught her in his arms. The red light rose out of her body in a mass of thick, heavy smoke. Egon fired a proton stream above Eduardo and Zora's heads, and in it a man of red light writhed and screamed.

'Oh, good,' Eduardo said irritably, rubbing Zora's arm as she trembled and cried. 'No one thought to fetch a trap while I was doing all that!'

Then a trap appeared. It opened, the entity was sucked inside and that was that. With the exception of Zora, everyone looked towards the elevator, from where the trap seemed to originate.

'Oh – hi, Garrett,' said Roland.

'Hey,' said Garrett, looking a little stunned. 'So... what just happened?'

'Um,' said Roland. 'I'll see if I can explain.'

Garrett, Egon and Janine gathered round to listen. Kylie stayed on the floor, trying to coax Pagan out from under the couch. Eduardo stayed with Zora, still vigorously rubbing her upper arm as she cried onto his shoulder.

'It's okay, _querida_,' he said. 'It's over.'

'I almost killed him!' Zora wept.

Eduardo took a moment to process this, and to realise that she was most concerned about Pagan.

'No – no you didn't!' he said. '_You_ stopped it. Zora, listen to me. That thing was controlling you, and you beat it.'

Zora pulled her head back to look at him, sniffed up an impressive amount of mucus and said, in a small voice, 'Really?'

'Really. Trust me, I know about these things. I'm a scientist. Now, we'd better let everyone know where you are, hadn't we? Garrett!' he called across the room.

Garrett turned round. 'Yeah?'

'Call Mrs Wilson.'

'Call Mrs Wilson?' echoed Garrett. 'Why do _I _have to call Mrs Wilson?'

'Because she knows you.'

'Hardly,' Garrett said, but he went anyway, to call Zora's school from Janine's desk.

'Okay,' said Janine, 'so... I'm confused. Roland, you're telling us that seriously nasty looking demon was a _dentist_? I mean... _just_ a dentist?'

'A dentist consumed by greed, I suppose,' said Egon, as he picked up the full ghost trap. 'I suspect there's very little of the original H. Gunson left in here. I'll put him in the containment unit.'

Eduardo, keeping a loose grip on Zora, turned his head to see how Kylie was getting on with Pagan. The cat was slinking out from under the couch, now that the atmosphere was considerably calmer. Kylie sat down and took him into her arms, where he curled up tightly against her chest and made a sort of frenzied purring noise.

'How is he?' asked Eduardo.

'Just a little shaken up,' said Kylie. 'He wasn't hurt. When I get him home and feed him, he'll forget all about it.'

'Hear that?' said Eduardo, giving Zora's arm a squeeze.

Zora, still hiccuping with tears, said, 'I'm so sorry, Kylie.'

'It wasn't you, Zora,' said Kylie.

A few minutes passed in which Kylie spoke soothingly to Pagan, and Eduardo patted Zora between the shoulder blades while her tears dried up. Then Garrett reappeared in the elevator, saying, 'They hadn't even noticed she was gone!'

'Are you _kidding_?' said Eduardo. 'What the hell kind of school _is_ it? What was Mr Fishman doing – feeling up Miss Ross in the stationery cupboard?'

'It's not Mr Fishman's fault,' said Zora. 'I told him I had to go to the nurse. And he sent me with Daisy, because she needed to go to the nurse too. She threw up all over her Aztecs project. So when we got to the nurse, I pretended I'd just been taking Daisy and said I was going back to class. Then I left.'

'Poor Daisy,' said Eduardo. 'That's kind of a coincidence... unless the ghost actually made her sick.'

'Mrs Wilson's calling your mom, Zora,' said Garrett. 'She should be here soon.'

'Thank you, Garrett,' said Zora. Then, slowly, she stepped away from Eduardo to approach Kylie and Pagan. 'Is he really okay?'

'He's calmed down a lot,' said Kylie. 'Why don't you give him a stroke?'

'He might not want me to.'

'Try it and see.'

Zora reached out and touched Pagan's head, and he was fine with it. He knew very well whether somebody liked him, or they were being controlled by something that wanted to kill him, and everything in between.

'I hope Mr Fishman won't get into trouble,' said Zora. 'He didn't ask any questions because I told him I had cramps.'

'Yep, that'll work,' said Kylie.

'But that wasn't the ghost, was it, thinking of all that?'

'Oh, that's okay, sweetie. They can see into your mind and use what you know.'

'Oh,' said Zora. 'Well... good. And Mr Fishman did send two of us, like he's supposed to. He only feels up Miss Ross at lunchtimes.'

'He does?' said Kylie.

'Well, that's what people say.'

Zora carried on stroking Pagan until Helen arrived. Janine escorted her upstairs, and Egon went with them, thinking he might be called upon to explain a few things.

'Mom!' Zora cried, cannoning into Helen's arms and breaking down into tears.

'It's okay, sweetie,' said Helen, rubbing her back. 'What the hell happened? How did they let you escape from school? I thought the tooth fairy was dealt with. Why would you come _here?'_

'Perhaps you'd like me to explain, Ms Stephens,' said Egon.

'Mommy, I want to go home,' said Zora.

'All right, sweetie,' said Helen. Then, to Egon, 'Maybe not right now.'

'Eduardo saved me,' Zora added.

'He did?' Helen looked at Eduardo with adoring eyes. 'Oh, I knew you would!'

'Um.' Eduardo looked taken aback. 'Well, it wasn't just me. We're a team, y'know?'

'You're a Godsend,' Helen went on. 'You've never been anything but kind and supportive to Zora. She needs more people like you in her life, Eduardo.'

'Careful, Mom, he's seeing someone,' said Zora. '_And_ it's a man.'

Eduardo blinked in surprise. 'It is?'

'Sure it is,' said Zora. 'Garrett's very lucky to have you.'

Garrett had never in his life looked more horrified. Kylie started to laugh silently. Even Eduardo was tickled. Egon, Janine and Roland could, at first, only stand there looking puzzled.

'Oh,' Zora went on, reaching into her jacket pocket, 'here's that other five dollars. Can we put it in a collecting tin, Mom?'

'Of course we can, honey,' said Helen. Then she looked from Garrett to Eduardo, and added, 'See you guys in the playground sometime, I guess.'

She and Zora then made to leave, and Janine escorted them downstairs, with Egon following. There was a silence. Then, when they could bear it no longer, Kylie and Roland burst into guffaws.

'Garrett!' said Kylie, once she'd got back some of her composure. 'You bitch!'

'Shut up,' said Garrett. 'It's not even the _tiniest_ bit funny.'

'I noticed you didn't correct her,' Roland giggled.

'Nor did he!' said Garrett, indicating Eduardo.

Eduardo, laughing a little himself, said, 'Well, it might not be a bad thing if Helen thinks I'm gay.'

'That child is insane,' said Garrett.

'Whatever, Garrett,' said Kylie. 'Do you want him tonight, or can I have him?'

'That's not funny, Kylie.'

'Are you sure about that? If you want to entice him back to your lair...'

'Yeah, okay, I get the point. Very funny, ha ha ha,' said Garrett. Then he wheeled himself off to the kitchen, hoping to find something in the fridge that would calm his temper.

Eduardo joined Kylie on the couch and, stroking Pagan's head, he asked, 'Is he really okay?'

'He's fine,' said Kylie. 'You absolutely wonderful man – you saved him!'

'Well, we've all had to try and get through to possessed people. Thank you for being so nice to her.'

'Yeah, well, you were right – it wasn't her fault. Anyway, what about you? What did the doctor say?'

'Three broken ribs. It ain't serious.'

'It's serious to _me_ if anyone hurts you. Three ribs! I'm glad Pagan savaged that little bitch.'

'He savaged her all right,' said Eduardo, tickling Pagan under the chin, which he liked very much.

'You know,' Kylie said quietly, 'he's really starting to make an emotional investment in you.'

'Yeah, well,' said Eduardo, sensing that Roland had vanished, as well as everybody else. 'Your kitty seems to like my petting technique.'

Kylie gave a snort of laughter, and said, 'Don't! I'm trying to be serious.'

'Sorry.'

'I'm trying to tell you... I love you.'

Eduardo looked up, from Pagan's eyes to hers, and there was an agonising moment of silence. Then he said, 'Yeah?'

'Yeah.'

'Well, I love you too.'

They kissed, of course, and then Kylie said breathlessly, 'Tell me how to say it in Spanish.'

He leaned over and whispered it in her ear. '_Te amo_.'

She whispered back, '_Te amo_.'

'_Sí_.'

'Mrrrrrrrr-ow?'

'_Te amo también_, Pagan.'

THE END


End file.
